She could bear it no longer. She
started forward and put her arms around his neck, and dropped her head
upon his bosom, and whispered in suppressed tones:
"Dearest Thurston, what is the matter? Tell me, for I love you more than
life!"
The man clasped his left arm fiercely around her waist, lifted his right
hand, and, hissing sharply through his clenched teeth:
"You have drawn on your own doom--die, wretched girl!" plunged a dagger
in her bosom, and pushed her from him.
One sudden, piercing shriek, and she dropped at his feet, grasping at
the ground, and writhing in agony. Her soul seemed striving to recover
the shock, and recollect its faculties. She half arose upon her elbow,
supported her head upon her hand, and with her other hand drew the steel
out from her bosom, and laid it down. The blood followed, and with the
life-stream her strength flowed away. The hand that supported her head
suddenly dropped, and she fell back. The man had been standing over her,
speechless, motionless, breathless, like some wretched somnambulist,
suddenly awakened in the commission of a crime, and gazing in horror,
amazement, and unbelief upon the work of his sleep.
Suddenly he dropped upon his knees by her side, put his arm under her
head and shoulders and raised her up; but her chin fell forward upon her
bosom, and her eyes fixed and glazed.
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