The Equinox (Volume I, Number II)

THE EQUINOX “*T have it,’ said I. ‘I will climb down and bring up the ermine.’ “ She shuddered at the idea. Her dead mother’s furs! “Tt must be,’ I said firmly. “*Go, brave knight !’—a delicate smile lit up her face— ‘I trust myself to you.’ “T bent on my right knee to her. ‘I take you,’ I said, ‘to be my lady, to fight in your cause, to honour and love you for ever.’ “She put out her right hand—oh, the delicate beauty of it | I kissed it. ‘My knight,’ she said, ‘Jean is below; he may hear you; you go perhaps to your death—kiss me!’ “With a sob I caught her once full in my arms, and our mouths met. I closed my eyes in trance ; my muscles failed; I sank, my forehead to the ground before her. “When I opened my eyes again she too was praying. Softly, without a word, I stepped to the window, took the dagger in my teeth, dropped from the edge, landed lightly beside the corpse. She was quite dead, the skull broken in, the teeth exposed in a last snarl. She lay on her back; I opened the coat, turned her over. The gruesome task was nearly finished when the door of the house opened, and an old man, his face scarred, one lip cut half away in some old brawl, so that he grinned horribly and askew, rushed out at me, a rapier in his hand. My stiletto, though long beyond the ordinary, was useless against a tool of such superior reach. “A last wrench gave me the ermine cloak, an invaluable parry. Could I entangle his sword, he was at my mercy. He saw it, and fenced warily. Indeed, I had the upper hand throughout. Threatening to throw the cloak, catch his 120