“Lift him to me,” said Romayne.
I could barely hear the words: even his strength to whisper seemed to be fast leaving him. He kissed his son—with a panting fatigue under that trifling exertion, pitiable to see. As I placed the boy on his feet again, he looked up at his dying father, with the one idea still in his mind.
“More, papa! More!”
Romayne put the will into his hand.
The child’s eyes sparkled. “Burn?” he asked, eagerly.
“Yes!”
Father Benwell sprang forward with outstretched hands. I stopped him. He struggled with me. I forgot the privilege of the black robe. I took him by the throat.
The boy threw the will into the fire. “Oh!” he shouted, in high delight, and clapped his chubby hands as the bright little blaze flew up the chimney. I released the priest.
In a frenzy of rage and despair, he looked round at the persons in the room. “I take you all to witness,” he cried; “this is an act of madness!”
“You yourself declared just now,” said the lawyer, “that Mr. Romayne was in perfect possession of his faculties.”