He will die peacefully in his bed, there will be a magnificent funeral, and masses will be sung for the repose of his soul." While he spoke the Counsellor had taken the little bottle from beside his account books and was turning it over and over between his fingers.
"Yes," murmured he, thoughtfully; "the Duke is quite likely to outlive us all, unless, indeed----" He took the cork from the bottle, and poured a little of the contents into the palm of his hand.

A few grains of fine white powder, glittering like crystal, appeared on the brown skin of the Counsellor.
"And yet," he went on, in cold, sinister accents, "let him take but a small pinch of this, and no one need fear his tyranny again in this world.

No one is much afraid of a man who lies some six feet under ground, shut up in a strong oak coffin, with a finely carved gravestone over his head." He stopped short, and fixed his keen eyes upon the agitated girl, who stood in front of him.

For at least two minutes the man and the girl stood face to face, motionless, and without exchanging a word.

Through the dead, weird silence, the pulsations of their hearts were plainly audible.