Page 130 (1/1)

"Monsieur le Marquis," he was saying, "is a gentleman whom it is, indeed, an honour to serve--"

A scream burst from him with the last word, for the lash of my whip had burnt a wheal upon his well-fed sides

"It is an honour that shall be yours no h into the air asround, his face twisted with pain, his flabby cheeks white with fear, and his eyes ith anger, for as yet the full force of the situation had not been borne in upon hi of the awful passion that must have been stamped uponthat I did not understand for I was past understanding ain and caught hiuish of both flesh and spirit But I was pitiless He had ruined , and, as God lived, he should pay the only price that it lay in his power to pay--the price of physical suffering Again and again my whip hissed about his head and cut into his soft white flesh, whilst roaring for mercy he moved and rocked on his knees before me Instinctively he approached ive my lash the better play He held out his arht the embrace, and started a red wheal across their whiteness He tucked theround

Then I remember that some of my men essayed to restrain me, which to my passion was as the wind to a blaze I crackedthem to keep their distance lest they were ation And so fearful an airback and watched their leader's punishment in silence

When I think of it now, I take no little shame at the memory of how I beat him It is, indeed, with deep reluctance and yet deeper shaht myself to write of it If I offend you with this account of that horsewhipping, let necessity beitself I have, unfortunately, no apology, save the blind fury that obsessed y at all

Upon the morrow I repented me already with much bitterness But in that hour I knew no reason I was mad, and of my madness was born this harsh brutality