"A dagger!" he exclaimed, with a shudder, and a recoil. "Madame, are you
talking of murder?"
"I told you!" she said, through her closed teeth, and with her eyes
flaming like fire, "that ridding the earth of that fiend incarnate would
be a good deed, and no murder! I would do it myself if I could take
him off his guard; but he never is that with me; and then my arm is not
strong enough to reach his black heart through all that mass of
brawn, and blood, and muscle. No, Sir Norman, Doom has allotted it to
you--obey, and I swear to you, you shall go free; refuse--and in ten
minutes your head will roll under the executioner's axe!"
"Better that than the freedom you offer! Madame, I cannot murder!"
"Coward!" she passionately cried; "you fear to do it, and yet you have
but a life to lose, and that is lost to you now!"
Sir Norman raised his head; and even in the darkness she saw the haughty
flush that crimsoned his face.
"I fear no man living; but, madame, I fear One who is higher than man!"
"But you will die if you refuse; and I repeat, again and again, there is
no risk. These guards will not let you out; but there are more ways of
leaving a room than through the door, and I can lead you up behind the
tapestry to where he is standing, and you can stab him through the back,
and escape with me! Quick, quick, there is no time to lose!"
"I cannot do it!" he said, resolutely, drawing back and folding his
arms. "In short, I will not do it!"
There was such a terrible look in the beautiful eyes, that he half
expected to see her spring at him like a wild cat, and bury the dagger
in his own breast. But the rule of life works by contraries: expect
a blow and you will get a kiss, look for an embrace, and you will be
startled by a kick. When the virago spoke, her voice was calm, compared
with what it had been before, even mild.
"You refuse! Well, a willful man must have him way; and since you are
so qualmish about a little bloodletting, we must try another plan. If I
release you--for short as the time is, I can do it--will you promise me
to go direct to the king this very night, and inform him of all you've
seen and heard here?"
She looked at him with an eagerness that was almost fierce; and in spite
of her steady voice, there was something throbbing and quivering, deadly
and terrible, in her upturned face. The form she looked at was erect
and immovable, the eyes were quietly resolved, the mouth half-pityingly,
half-sadly smiling.