Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 3.djvu/271

260 the man who found in him at once hís murderer and her paramour; he was torn out from his lair and tossed upward, as a wrecker's hands may toss a beam of driftwood.

Erceldoune forced him downward into the circle of the burning pines, full in their light and full in her sight. He only knew that this was the man who had sought to assassinate him; that this was the man for whom and to whom she betrayed him.

Yet, beyond the memory of his vengeance, beyond the violence of his hatred, beyond the rage of jealousy in his soul, was a terrible pathos of wonder that looked out at her from the reproach of his eyes;—it was for a thing so vile as this she had betrayed him! it was for a life so infamous as this that she had given herself to guilt! Reeling, swaying, striving, they wrestled breast to breast, strangers from the far ends of the earth, yet bound together by the kinships of wrong and of hate, while she, who had cast herself between them, strove to part them—strove to tear them asunder—strove with desperate strength to end their contest. Erceldoune flung her heavily off him.

"You stayed my hand once—not again. Stand there, and see the felon you harbour die as curs die!"