This last,
completely unstrung by such a show of agility on the part of a dead man,
was trembling yet. A very faint mist of smoke hung before his face which
had an extraordinary aspect, as if the lower jaw had come unhinged.
"Not missed!" he croaked, hoarsely, from the depths of a dry throat.
This sinister sound loosened the spell that had fallen on General
D'Hubert's senses. "Yes, missed--a bout portant," he heard himself
saying, almost before he had recovered the full command of his
faculties. The revulsion of feeling was accompanied by a gust of
homicidal fury, resuming in its violence the accumulated resentment of
a lifetime. For years General D 'Hubert had been exasperated and
humiliated by an atrocious absurdity imposed upon him by this man's
savage caprice. Besides, General D'Hubert had been in this last instance
too unwilling to confront death for the reaction of his anguish not to
take the shape of a desire to kill. "And I have my two shots to fire
yet," he added, pitilessly.
General Feraud snapped-to his teeth, and his face assumed an irate,
undaunted expression.
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