"Try-try-trying to-kill-me-eh? You-you mad brute!" gutters out the
struggling man, his eyes starting from the sockets like balls of
fire, while gore and saliva foam from his mouth and nostrils as if
his struggles are in death.
"Kill ye-kill ye?" Romescos rejoins, the shaggy red hair falling in
tufts about his face, now burning with desperation: "it would be
killin' only a wretch whose death society calls for."
At this, the struggling man, like one borne to energy by the last
throes of despair, gives a desperate spring, succeeds in turning his
antagonist, grasps him by the throat with his left hand, and from
his pocket fires a pistol with his right. The report alarms; the
shrill whistle calls to the rescue; but the ball has only taken
effect in the flesh of Romescos's right arm. Quick to the moment,
his arm dripping with gore from the wound, he draws his glittering
dirk, and plunges it, with unerring aim, into the breast of his
antagonist. The wounded man starts convulsively, as the other coolly
draws back the weapon, the blood gushing forth in a livid stream.
"Is not that in self-defence?" exclaims the bloody votary, turning
his haggard and enraged face to receive the approval of the
bystanders. The dying man, writhing under the grasp of his murderer,
utters a piercing shriek. "Murdered! I'm dying! Oh, heaven! is this
my last-last-last? Forgive me, Lord,--forgive me!" he gurgles; and
making another convulsive effort, wrings his body from under the
perpetrator of the foul deed.
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