The mill-wheel sounded louder and louder in her ears.
"You let in the river!" she cried. "You drove him into the wheel--you
killed him!"
"What else was there to do?" he demanded. "It had to be done, and it
was the safest way. It would be an accident. Such a thing might easily
happen."
"You have murdered him!" she gasped with a wild look.
"To call it murder!" he sneered. "Surely my wife would not call it
murder."
"Fiend--not to have the courage to fight him!" she flung back at him.
"To crawl like a snake and let loose a river on a man! In any other
country, he'd have been given a chance."
This was his act in a new light. He had had only one idea in his mind
when he planned the act, and that was punishment. What rights had a man
who had stolen what was nearer and dearer than a man's own flesh, and for
which he would have given his own flesh fifty times? Was it that Carmen
would now have him believe he ought to have fought the man, who had
spoiled his life and ruined a woman's whole existence.
"What chance had I when he robbed me in the dark of what is worth fifty
times my own life to me?" he asked savagely.
Pages:
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107