The vision bothered him and he closed his eyes in order to sleep. Absolute darkness; sleep was overpowering him, but his closed eyes were beginning to fill the dense gloom with red points which kept growing larger, forming spots of various colours; and the spots, after floating about capriciously, joined themselves together, amalgamated, and again there stood Pimentó, who approached him slowly, with the cautious ferocity of an evil beast which fascinates its victim.
Batiste tried to free himself from the nightmare.
He did not sleep; he heard his wife snoring close to him, and his sons overcome with weariness, but all the while he was hearing them lower and lower, as if some mysterious force were carrying the farm-house away, far away, to a distance: and he there inert, unable to move, no matter how hard he tried, saw the face of Pimentó close to his own, and felt in his nostrils his enemy's hot breath.
But was he not dead?... His dulled brain kept asking this question, and after many efforts, he answered himself that Pimentó had died. Now he did not have a broken head as before: his body was exposed, torn by two wounds, though Batiste was not able to determine where they were; but two wounds he had, two inexhaustible fountains of blood, which opened livid lips. The two gunshots, he already knew it: he was not one to miss his aim.
And the phantom, enveloping his face with its burning breath, fixed a glance upon him which pierced his eyes, and descended lower and lower until it tore his very vitals.
"Pardon, Pimentó!" groaned the wounded man, terrified by the nightmare, and trembling like a child.
Yes, he ought to forgive him. He had killed him, it was true; but he should consider that he had been the first to attack him. Come! Men who are men ought to be reasonable! It was he who was to blame!
But the dead do not listen to reason, and the spectre, behaving like a bandit, smiled fiercely, and with a bound, landed on the bed, and seated himself upon him, pressing upon the sick man's wound with all his weight.
Batiste groaned painfully, unable to move and cast off the heavy mass. He tried to persuade him, calling him Toni with familiar tenderness, instead of designating him by his nickname.
"Toni, you are hurting me!"