The pointing of the plan was desperate and simple. It was neither more
nor less than this: I knew the house and every turn and passage in it,
and when the hour should strike I said I should go down and skulk among
the guests, and at the crucial moment find or seize a weapon and fling
myself upon this bridegroom as he should kneel before the altar.

With strength to bend him back and strike one blow, I saw not why it
might not win. And as for strength, I have learned this in war: that so
the rage be hot enough 'twill nerve a dying man to hack and hew and stab
as with the strength of ten.

Although it was most terribly over-long in coming, the end of that black
day did come at last, and with it Darius to fetch my supper and the
candles. You may be sure I questioned him, and, if you know the blacks,
you'll smile and say I had my labor for my pains--the which I had. His
place was at the quarters, and of what went on within the house he knew
no more than I. But this he told me; that company surely was expected,
and that some air of mystery was abroad.

When he was gone I ate a soldier's portion, knowing of old how ill a
thing it is to take an empty stomach into battle. For the same cause I
drank a second cup of wine,--'twas old madeira of my father's
laying-in,--and would have drunk a third but that the bottle would not
yield it.

It was fully dark when I had finished, and, thinking ever on my plan,
would strive afresh to weld its weakest link. This was the hazard of the
weapon-getting. With full-blood health and strength I might have gone
bare-handed; but as it was, I feared to take the chance. So with a