'Your grief has affected your brain! I can pardon much in you
today, sir, but beware how you again attempt to degrade me!'
"'Hear him!' was the hoarse and furious reply of Judge Conway; and
reaching out his thin fingers, a habit he had caught from Mr.
Randolph--he pointed at me where I stood.
"'Hear him! He affects innocence! He is outraged! He is indignant! And
yet he waylaid my brother, whom he has hated for twenty years--he
waylaid him like an assassin, and murdered him! There is the proof!'
"And drawing from his pocket a knife, covered with clotted blood, he
threw it upon the grave before all eyes.
"Good God! It was my own!"
XXI.
THE CHAIN OF EVIDENCE.
"At the sight of that terrible object" continued General Davenant, "I
staggered back, and nearly fell. I could not believe my eyes--never
thought of denying the ownership of the fearful witness,--I could only
gaze at it, with a wild horror creeping over me, and then all these
terrible emotions were too much for me.
"I took two steps toward the grave, reached out with a shudder to grasp
the knife whose clots of blood seemed to burn themselves into my
brain--then vertigo seized me, and letting my head fall, I fainted.
"When I regained my senses, I was in my carriage, supported by the arms
of my wife, and rolling up the avenue to my own house.
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