So matters stood till last year in the winter, and then my father set his heart on killing twenty of the headmen, with their wives and children, because he knew that they plotted against him.

But the headmen learned what was to come, and they prevailed upon a wife of my father, a woman of their own blood, to poison him.

So she poisoned him in the night and in the morning it was told me that my father lay sick and summoned me, and I went to him.

In his hut I found him, and he was writhing with pain.
"'What is it, my father ?' I said.

'Who has done this evil ?' "'It is this, my son,' he gasped, 'that I am poisoned, and she stands yonder who has done the deed.' And he pointed to the woman, who stood at the side of the hut near the door, her chin upon her breast, trembling as she looked upon the fruit of her wickedness.
"Now the girl was young and fair, and we had been friends, yet I say that I did not pause, for my heart was mad within me.