The very magnitude of the racket he raised was funny.But he couldn't keep up that violent exertion continuously, and when he stopped to rest we could hear him shouting to himself in vengeful tones.He saw it all! He had been decoyed there! (Rattle, rattle, rattle.) He had been decoyed into that town, he screamed, getting more and more excited by the noise he made himself, in order to be exposed to this! (Rattle, rattle.) By this shameless CATIN! CATIN! CATIN!"He started at the door again with superhuman vigour.Behind me Iheard Dona Rita laughing softly, statuesque, turned all dark in the fading glow.I called out to her quite openly, "Do keep your self-control." And she called back to me in a clear voice: "Oh, my dear, will you ever consent to speak to me after all this? But don't ask for the impossible.He was born to be laughed at.""Yes," I cried."But don't let yourself go."I don't know whether Ortega heard us.He was exerting then his utmost strength of lung against the infamous plot to expose him to the derision of the fiendish associates of that obscene woman!..
.Then he began another interlude upon the door, so sustained and strong that I had the thought that this was growing absurdly impossible, that either the plaster would begin to fall off the ceiling or he would drop dead next moment, out there.
He stopped, uttered a few curses at the door, and seemed calmer from sheer exhaustion.
"This story will be all over the world," we heard him begin.
"Deceived, decoyed, inveighed, in order to be made a laughing-stock before the most debased of all mankind, that woman and her associates." This was really a meditation.And then he screamed:
"I will kill you all." Once more he started worrying the door but it was a startlingly feeble effort which he abandoned almost at once.He must have been at the end of his strength.Dona Rita from the middle of the room asked me recklessly loud: "Tell me!
Wasn't he born to be laughed at?" I didn't answer her.I was so near the door that I thought I ought to hear him panting there.He was terrifying, but he was not serious.He was at the end of his strength, of his breath, of every kind of endurance, but I did not know it.He was done up, finished; but perhaps he did not know it himself.How still he was! Just as I began to wonder at it, Iheard him distinctly give a slap to his forehead."I see it all!"he cried."That miserable, canting peasant-woman upstairs has arranged it all.No doubt she consulted her priests.I must regain my self-respect.Let her die first." I heard him make a dash for the foot of the stairs.I was appalled; yet to think of Therese being hoisted with her own petard was like a turn of affairs in a farce.A very ferocious farce.Instinctively Iunlocked the door.Dona Rita's contralto laugh rang out loud, bitter, and contemptuous; and I heard Ortega's distracted screaming as if under torture."It hurts! It hurts! It hurts!" Ihesitated just an instant, half a second, no more, but before Icould open the door wide there was in the hall a short groan and the sound of a heavy fall.
The sight of Ortega lying on his back at the foot of the stairs arrested me in the doorway.One of his legs was drawn up, the other extended fully, his foot very near the pedestal of the silver statuette holding the feeble and tenacious gleam which made the shadows so heavy in that hall.One of his arms lay across his breast.The other arm was extended full length on the white-and-black pavement with the hand palm upwards and the fingers rigidly spread out.The shadow of the lowest step slanted across his face but one whisker and part of his chin could be made out.He appeared strangely flattened.He didn't move at all.He was in his shirt-sleeves.I felt an extreme distaste for that sight.The characteristic sound of a key worrying in the lock stole into my ears.I couldn't locate it but I didn't attend much to that at first.I was engaged in watching Senor Ortega.But for his raised leg he clung so flat to the floor and had taken on himself such a distorted shape that he might have been the mere shadow of Senor Ortega.It was rather fascinating to see him so quiet at the end of all that fury, clamour, passion, and uproar.Surely there was never anything so still in the world as this Ortega.I had a bizarre notion that he was not to be disturbed.
A noise like the rattling of chain links, a small grind and click exploded in the stillness of the hall and a eciov began to swear in Italian.These surprising sounds were quite welcome, they recalled me to myself, and I perceived they came from the front door which seemed pushed a little ajar.Was somebody trying to get in? I had no objection, I went to the door and said: "Wait a moment, it's on the chain." The deep voice on the other side said: "What an extraordinary thing," and I assented mentally.It was extraordinary.The chain was never put up, but Therese was a thorough sort of person, and on this night she had put it up to keep no one out except myself.It was the old Italian and his daughters returning from the ball who were trying to get in.