''Twas not a light matter brought me here--a
message--there--well!--your right honourable father, that lies in lead
and oak, without a name on his coffin-lid, would have you to know that
what he said was--as it should be--and I can prove it--'
'What?--he said _what?_--what is it?--what can you prove? Speak out,
Sirrah!' and his eyes shone white in the moonlight, and his hand was
advanced towards Irons's throat, and he looked half beside himself, and
trembling all over.
'Put down your hand or you hear no more from me,' said Irons, also a
little transformed.
Mervyn silently lowered his hand clenched by his side, and, with
compressed lips, nodded an impatient sign to him.
'Yes, Sir, he'd have you to understand he never did it, and I can prove
it--_but I won't!_'
That moment, something glittered in Mervyn's hand, and he strode towards
Irons, overturning a chair with a crash.
'I have you--come on and you're a dead man,' said the clerk, in a hoarse
voice, drawing into the deep darkness toward the door, with the dull
gleam of a pistol-barrel just discernible in his extended hand.
'Stay--don't go,' cried Mervyn, in a piercing voice; 'I conjure--I
implore--whatever you are, come back--see, I'm unarmed,' (and he flung
his sword back toward the window).
Pages:
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386