Was it a sick fancy, a probed heart, or did the phantom of the dead man
indeed give chase?
Ah! there is but one class of folks whose faith in spirits nothing can
shake--the guilty, the bloody-handed.
He came to a perturbed rest at the huge, half-hospitable Hospice, to the
enthusiasm of the postilions.
"Will the gentleman have a saddle-horse?"
"A chariot?"
"A cabriolet?"
"Ten francs to Andermatt!"
"Thirty francs to Fluelen!"
"One hundred francs," cried Plade, "for the fleetest pony to Andermatt.
Ten francs to the postilion who can saddle him in two minutes. My mother
is dying in Lyons."
He climbed one of the dark flights of stairs, and an old, uncleanly monk
gave him a glass of Kerschwasser. He descended to the stables, and
cursed the Swiss lackeys into speed. He gave such liberal largess that
there was an involuntary cheer, and as he galloped away the great
diligence appeared in sight to rouse his haste to frenzy.
The telegraph kept above him--a single line; he knew the tardiness of
foot when pursued by the lightning. In one place, the conductor,
wrenched from the insulators, dropped almost to the ground. There was a
strap upon his saddle; he reined his nag to the side of the road, and,
making a knot about the wire, dashed off at a bound; the iron snapped
behind; his triumphant laugh pealed yet on the twilight, when the cries
of his pursuers rang over the fields of snow.
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