He beheld instantly what had occurred, and that he had, without
so intending, killed a fellow-man. The knife, turned away from
his own person, had in their fall been plunged into the bosom of
the other, and he now lay quivering in the last throes of death.
As Jonathan gazed he beheld a thin red stream trickle out from
the parted and grinning lips; he beheld the eyes turn inward; he
beheld the eyelids contract; he beheld the figure stretch itself;
he beheld it become still in death.
IV. The Momentous Adventure with the Stranger with the Silver
Ear-rings
So our hero stood stunned and bedazed, gazing down upon his
victim, like a man turned into a stone. His brain appeared to him
to expand like a bubble, the blood surged and bummed in his ears
with every gigantic beat of his heart, his vision swam, and his
trembling hands were bedewed with a cold and repugnant sweat. The
dead figure upon the floor at his feet gazed at him with a wide,
glassy stare, and in the confusion of his mind it appeared to
Jonathan that he was, indeed, a murderer.
What monstrous thing was this that had befallen him who, but a
moment before, had been so entirely innocent of the guilt of
blood? What was he now to do in such an extremity as this, with
his victim lying dead at his feet, a poniard in his heart? Who
would believe him to be guiltless of crime with such a dreadful
evidence as this presented against him? How was he, a stranger in
a foreign land, to totally defend himself against an accusing of
mistaken justice? At these thoughts a developed terror gripped at
his vitals and a sweat as cold as ice bedewed his entire body.
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