“And you--you will know what you have lost when I am no more. I may die;
but the memory of my love will never die: it will rankle ever in you
like a wound which opens daily afresh, and becomes constantly sorer.
You triumph now, Henrietta; but remember, that between your lips and
Daniel’s there will forever rise the shadow of Sarah Brandon.”
As she said the last words, she raised a small phial, which she held in
her hand, with an indescribably swift movement to her lips: she drank
the contents, and, sinking into a chair, said,--
“Now I defy you all!”
“Ah, she escapes after all!” exclaimed Malgat, “she escapes from
justice!” He rushed forward to assist her; but Daniel stepped between,
and said,--
“Let her die.”
Already horrible convulsions began to seize her; and the penetrating
smell of bitter almonds, which slowly filled the whole room, told but
too plainly that the poison which she had taken was one of those from
which there is no rescue.
She was carried to her bed; and in less than ten minutes she was dead:
she had never uttered another word.
Henrietta and Mrs. Bertolle were kneeling by the side of the bed, and
the count was sobbing in a corner of the room, when a police-sergeant
entered.
“The woman Brian is not to be found,” he said; “but M. Elgin has been
arrested. Where is the Countess Ville-Handry?”
Daniel pointed at the body.
“Dead?” said the officer. “Then I have nothing more to do here.”
He was going out, when Malgat stopped him.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” he said. “I wish to state that I am not
Ravinet, dealer in curiosities; but that my true name is Malgat,
formerly cashier of the Mutual Discount Society, sentenced _in
contumaciam_ to ten years’ penal servitude. I am ready to be tried, and
place myself in your hands.”