Revenge, however, grew no less desirable in the light of sorrow.
He looked to it more and more eagerly as the only food which could lead to
peace of mind. His road probably embraced the circumstances of an
ignominious death; but none the less peace would follow--a peace beyond the
power of future life on earth to supply. Thus, at least, did his project
then present itself to him. Thought of the meeting with his enemy grew to
be a luxury which he feasted upon in the night watches after fruitless days
and the investigation of endless miles of pictures. Then he would lie awake
and imagine the inevitable climax. He saw himself standing before the man
who had ruined two lives; he felt his hand close over a knife or a pistol,
and wondered which it should be; he heard his own voice, slow and steady,
pronounce sentence of death, and he saw terror light that other man's face
as the blood fled from it. He rehearsed the words he should utter at that
great juncture and speculated as to what manner of answer would come; then
the last scene of all represented his enemy stretched dead at his feet and
himself with his hands linked in iron. There yet remained the end of the
tragedy for him--a spectacle horrible enough in the eyes of those still
left to love him, but for himself empty of terror, innocent of power to
alarm. Clean-living men would pity him, religious men would see in him an
instrument used by God to strike at a sinner.
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