Oh, Geraldine, how
beautiful it would have been to die for you!--to go to death with
your name upon my lips!--to bless you!--to thank you for my happy
lot, as the axe was already uplifted to smite off my head! How
beautiful to think that death does not separate us, but is only the
way to an eternal union; that we should lose each other but a brief
moment here, to find each other again forevermore!"
Geraldine writhed at his feet like a worm trodden upon; and her
groans of distress and her smothered moans were the heartrending
accompaniment of his melancholy words.
"But that is now all over!" cried Henry Howard; and his face, which
was before convulsed with grief and agony, now glowed again with
wrath. "You have poisoned my life and my death; and I shall curse
you for it, and my last word will be a malediction on the harlequin
Geraldine!"
"Have pity!" groaned Jane. "Kill me, Henry; stamp my head beneath
your feet; only let this torture end!"
"Nay, no pity!" yelled he, wildly; "no pity for this impostor, who
has stolen my heart and crept like a thief into my love! Arise, and
leave this room; for you fill me with horror; and when I behold you,
I feel only that I must curse you! Ay, a curse on you and shame,
Geraldine! Curse on the kisses that I have impressed on your lips--
on the tears of rapture that I have wept on your bosom. When I
ascend the scaffold, I will curse you, and my last words shall be:
'Woe to Geraldine!--for she is my murderess!'"
He stood there before her with arm raised on high, proud and great
in his wrath.
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