But I had played right into Belleville's hands. "Hear him implore you!" cried Belleville. "Oh! I can't, I can't," she wailed. "'Tis only a spirit--and it's the only way," he protested warmly. Miss Ottley swung around suddenly and drove the dagger at his heart, but he had been expecting it. He caught her wrist and laughed. Then all my anguish recommenced. In the midst of it, made desperate, the girl leaned right across the bed and struck. The blade glanced down upon a rib and deeply pierced my side. Providence, surely, had directed the blow. She withdrew the dagger, then screamed aloud to see it dripping with blood. Belleville caught her in his arms and bore her roughly back. He bent her body on a table until she was as helpless as a dove, then took the blade and drew the horrid thing across her lips; so they were carmined with my blood. "By this and this you'll remember you are mine," he said, and kissed her lips till his were bloody, too. Then the two stared deep into each other's eyes. "I've killed his body; you, his soul," said Belleville. "We're well mated, you and I. There--I've no longer any fear you'll hurt yourself. You'll be henceforth too much afraid of him to die." He let her go, and stood away from her. She swayed erect, then came forward till she stood beside me. I held my very breath for fear that she would hear. I don't know why. "It is all a trick--a cruel, devilish trick. There's nothing there!" said the girl, her bosom heaving as she spoke. Belleville laughed like a hyena. "Feel--if you dare!" he cried. But she took him at his word. Her hands went out and, guided by a dark blotch which, as afterwards I learned she saw, she put them on my wound and drew them swiftly back ensanguined. Then horror settled on her like a black cloud on a mountain top. She turned about with one loud gasping sigh and sank down in a lifeless heap at Belleville's feet. Soon afterwards I swooned, too, from pain and loss of blood. When I awoke my wound was neatly bandaged, and I was once more seated in my chair. Belleville sat opposite smoking a cigar. He was dressed very smartly in a frock suit and a tall hat was set jauntily on his brow. He wore a geranium in his buttonhole. His face was wreathed in smiles. A bottle of champagne was set before him on a table and he sipped at a glass with an air of triumphant good-humour. I found that I could speak; my gag had been removed. "Water!" I implored him. He started, then pressed forward with his glass. "Where the devil is your mouth?" he said. He could not see me, that was plain. "Here!" said I. "Water." "It is my wedding morn--and you shall toast me in wine or go thirsting," he rapped out. Then he found my lips and I drank life into my veins. I have never tasted draught one-half so glorious. "I was married less than an hour ago," he said, "at a registrar's office. She's no longer Miss Ottley, Pinsent." I was silent. "Do you hear me, man?" he demanded. "I hear," I answered.