"I shall soon be dead," said Baluzzi, while spasmodic gasps interrupted the words brought out with such difficulty. "_Corpo di bacco!_ I should not have believed that it would come so soon, but I feel it is to be, and the frontier official, who was a surgeon formerly, says so too. People follow many trades here." "I am sorry for you, Baluzzi! How could you enter upon so insane an undertaking?" "Insane? _L'assicuro di no!_ I have often had the most splendid success, but misfortune must befall all in time; you, too, Herr von Blanden, and I am glad, because I have the right to hate you." The Italian's dim eyes gleamed, he clenched his hand convulsively, and then let it fall again upon the pillow. "What do these insinuations mean?--speak! If you have a secret to confide to me do not hesitate, for it might easily become too late." "A secret of a strange kind," said Baluzzi, as he tossed about and groaned. "Haha, now it will come upon her, too. This bullet speeds beyond the frontier--and into her heart! I foretold it to her when she gave me up in her unworthy pride. I was too weak. I let myself be dazzled by the gold that she promised and gave me! But now it is all over, death is approaching, it needs no bribe. Now I will speak! That was the agreement. I shall hold firmly to it!" "You speak in riddles," said Blanden. "As she will no longer rest in my arms, neither shall she in yours," said the Italian. "I shall assert my rights. I shall preserve them with my last breath, long as I may have denied them. That is worthy of a brave man. She is mine, and belongs to this death-bed." "Of whom do you speak?" cried Blanden, more astonished. "Of Giulia, your--mistress!" "Hah, you scoundrel," cried Blanden, "I shall be forgetting that a dying man is before me, that these words are the unnecessary attacks of an expiring intellect." "You are mistaken," said Baluzzi, but pain compelled him to stop for a time and to speak more softly. "I speak the truth." "Fool--united to me at the altar!" "Null and invalid, null and invalid!" "Is there anything you wish, Baluzzi? I will gladly carry it out, but to listen longer to your wandering speech is impossible." "Wandering speech! Haha--am I a madman? Do I tear off the bandage which the wretched surgeon, the old frontier official, put on? Do I grope in the air half unconsciously? No, my mind is clear, clear as yours, clearer, perhaps, at this moment. I can understand that the world begins to go round with you when I repeat that 'Giulia can only be your mistress, because she is--my wife!'" "Your wife, madman!" Blanden shouted in a torrent of anger, then he shuddered. Various dark impressions, for which hitherto he could not account, swept suddenly over him, the possibility of what was incredible lay before him like a deep fearful abyss. "She has deceived you, _carissimo_!"