My own blood is cheap.

This will I pour out before thee with a willing heart; but spare, I beseech thee, this precious life, or commission some other than her husband to perform the bloody deed.
"In vain.

The conditions were prescribed; the decree had gone forth, and nothing remained but to execute it.

I rushed out of the house and across the intermediate fields, and stopped not till I entered my own parlour.
"My wife had remained here during my absence, in anxious expectation of my return with some tidings of her sister.

I had none to communicate.
For a time, I was breathless with my speed: This, and the tremors that shook my frame, and the wildness of my looks, alarmed her.