"'At length he taunted me as the husband of a lazarone. He pointed with hellish glee to where Lucia stood, the incarnation of perfection, and bade me behold what I had lost. My brain was on fire, a thousand furies tugged at my heartstrings, and as my father clasped my hands in his and looked down into my soul, I felt that savage joy again, and a demon possessed me. My father approached his face to mine, until his hot breath burned upon my cheek, and whispered in my ear; it was enough. With a loud laugh I left him and flew, rather than ran, to where my deserted wife was watching for me, sad and alone. "'Why did she not tax me with my perfidy? Why did not her angel soul arise in its innocent love, to crush me with the glancing of an eye? Oh, that she had uttered one reproach, one bitter word! She saw me, and with a cry of joy, cast her white arms about my neck, as on our marriage; they were like chains of searing, glowing iron to me, and I dashed her from me, howling in the delirium of my torments. She marked the wild fire that flashed from my eye, the dark flush that burned upon my cheek, my breast heaving with the struggles of the fiend within, my hair hanging in disordered masses over my throbbing brow, the cowardly trembling of the hand concealed in my bosom; she beheld a fiend incarnate in the form of one who had sworn to love and cherish her forever; yet no word of reproach arose from those lips I had so often kissed. Again her arms were about me, and again I attempted to dash her to the ground. "'"My husband, my dear Dominique!" she shrieked, clinging to me, and pressing her cheeks, pallid and cold, against mine, glowing and burning with the reflected fires of hell. The spell of madness fell upon me, as I struggled with that faithful wife, and hissing froth boiled from between my teeth, mingling with her long locks of auburn hair. I suffered all the torments of the damned as we swayed to and fro, until her strength began to fail and her arms relaxed their hold. Then, with a horrid laugh, I wound her long curls about my hand, and plunged a stiletto to its hilt in her breast. "'The warm blood of life poured in a torrent upon me, and as my victim lay gasping upon the ground, I danced frantically about her, laughing with glee. "'I did not wait to see her die--I _dared not_ do it--but all gory as I was, I returned to my father. He met me with a smile, and his calmness communicated itself to me. "'I was happy then--oh! yes, very happy! "'With blood upon my hand, and madness in my brain, I wooed Lucia with all the cunning of insanity, and another gentle heart soon beat for me alone.