"Here again, Mr. Ormiston? Is this the fifth or sixth time I've found
you in this place to-night?"
"La Masque!" he cried, between joy and surprise. "But surely, I was not
totally unexpected this time?"
"Perhaps not. You are waiting here for me to redeem my promise, I
suppose?"
"Can you doubt it? Since I knew you first, I have desired this hour as
the blind desire sight."
"Ah! And you will find it as sweet to look back upon as you have to look
forward to," said La Masque, derisively. "If you are wise for yourself,
Mr. Ormiston, you will pause here, and give me back that fatal word."
"Never, madame! And surely you will not be so pitilessly cruel as to
draw back, now?"
"No, I have promised, and I shall perform; and let the consequences be
what they may, they will rest upon your own head. You have been warned,
and you still insist."
"I still insist!"
"Then let us move farther over here into the shadow of the houses; this
moonlight is so dreadfully bright!"
They moved on into the deep shadow, and there was a pulse throbbing in
Ormiston's head and heart like the beating of a muffed drum. They paused
and faced each other silently.
"Quick, madame!" cried Ormiston, hoarsely, his whole face flushed
wildly.
His strange companion lifted her hand as if to remove the mask, and he
saw that it shook like an aspen. She made one motion as though about to
lift it, and then recoiled, as if from herself, in a sort of horror.
"My God! What is this man urging me to do? How can I ever fulfill that
fatal promise?"
"Madame, you torture me!" said Ormiston, whose face showed what he felt.
"You must keep your promise; so do not drive me wild waiting. Let me--"
He took a step toward her, as if to lift the mask himself, but she held
out both arms to keep him off.
"No, no, no! Come not near me, Malcolm Ormiston! Fated man, since you
will rush on your doom, Look! and let the sight blast you, if it will!"
She unfastened her mask, raised it, and with it the profusion of long,
sweeping black hair.
Ormiston did look--in much the same way, perhaps, that Zulinka looked
at the Veiled Prophet. The next moment there was a terrible cry, and he
fell headlong with a crash, as if a bullet had whined through his hart.