ETCHINGS: AFTERWARD
(Annie Reeve Aldrich: For Short Stories.)
It is deep winter. A fierce storm shakes the windows in their casement. Melting flakes were in his beard when he entered.
Within is no light save from the fire; a dull, steady glow that bathes the room in soft rose. There are lordly furnishings; about the floor great cushions; skins of the leopard and lion.
There is a screen.
My God, do not let me look behind that screen!
Hush! Where was I? Yes, on the furs before the fire, my head, with loosened hair, pillowed on the rug at his feet.
It was pleasant to listen to the raging of the wind.
He had come to tell me of his approaching marriage—a marriage of love, he said, and laughed.
It was then all the room seemed to burst into a firelight of blood; all the sounds of hell rang in my ears; and my wrist had the sudden strength of ten men to drive the blade in his breast. His great muscles and firm flesh gave momentary resistance to the point, and then, what joy to feel them yield, and the steel slip deftly in!
The wet crimson poured over my fingers into the creases of the palms he had kissed, and the dimples he had counted.
He rolled, so much clay, onto the white furs, and see, I have drawn the screen in front of him ... for he is still laughing ... the happy bridegroom.
I wish the bride might see that smile!
There is a dark stream crawling through the fur, meandering and choosing its crooked way like a little brook in the summer grasses, and it creeps on and on lazily toward the polished hearth. It will run on until the flames drink it ... and when it reaches them I must get some snow at the window and wash my hands ... but just now I can think of nothing but how long it will be by the tick of the carved clock against the wall before it reaches its goal ... of nothing but that, and how, when the fire sinks and crumbles to ashes the waiting shadows will steal from the corners where they hide and gather closer around me ... and I shall have to sit motionless until the dawn, lest by chance I should set my foot in that black little brook ... it is quiet ... but those shadows are only waiting ... waiting in the corners!