"To end his suffering... to end his suffering!"
He went back to the cabin, only to come out at once with his old double-barrelled musket, and he hastened to the little window of the sick room as if he feared to lose his determination; he thrust the gun through the opening.
Again he heard the agonizing panting, the chattering of teeth, the horrible shriek, now very near, as if he were at the victim's bedside. His eyes, accustomed to the darkness saw the bed at the back of the gloomy room, and the form that lay writhing in it,—the pale spot of the face, appearing and disappearing as the sick man twisted about desperately.
The father was frightened at the trembling of his hands and the agitation of his pulse; he, the son of the huerta, without any other diversion than the hunt, accustomed to shoot down birds almost without aiming at them.
The wailing of the poor mother brought back to his memory other groans of long long ago,—twenty-two years before—when she was giving birth to her only son upon that same bed.
To come to such an end!... His eyes, gazing heavenward, saw a black sky, intensely black, with not a star in sight, and obscured by his tears....
"Lord! To end his sufferings! To end his sufferings!"
And repeating these words he pressed the musket against his shoulder, seeking the lock with a tremulous finger.... Bang! Bang!
END