Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 3.djvu/368

Rh her life. The faith in him had been sore tried; but at length, after many days, his reward came.

Neither spoke. That one look uttered all between them.

Conrad Phaulcon pressed his hand closer yet upon the jagged steel that for a few brief moments still could thus hold life in him. Something of his old laugh hovered on his lips.

"Look! I make a fair ending. Pity there is no priest to crow above me. Death-bed repentance!—there is no coin like it; you sell the game you have lost already, and you buy such a fine aroma for nothing"

She shivered at the awful mirth as she stooped to him, and passed her hand over his forehead.

"Silence! Live rather to repent! He will forgive; and I—you have tried my mercy long, you need not fear it now."

"No," he muttered, more huskily, more faintly. "If you had been willing to take your vengeance you could—long ago—you knew what would have sent me to the galleys. But you were true to your word. Strange, strange enough! You were so bold, so careless, so proud, so reckless; but one could hold you in a bridle of iron, if once you had given your word!"