I've been
feeling the kiss he gave me at the window all to-night. And then I've
been falling--falling--falling in his black arms--down--down to hell
itself. Not that he is there; but I murdered him, you know--and some
one else besides, wasn't there?'
'This is like delirium, really, Fernando,' said Felix, putting his
arms round him to lay him down, as he raised himself on his elbow. 'I
must call some one if you seem so ill.'
'I wish it was illness,' said Fernando with a shudder. 'Oh! don't go-
--don't let me go--if you can bear to touch me--when you know all!'
'There can't be any worse to know. You had better not talk.'
'I must! I must tell you all I really am, though you will never let
your brothers come near me, or the little angels--your sisters. I'd
not have dared look at them myself if I had known it, but things
never seemed so to me before.'
Felix shivered at the thought of what he was to hear, but he gave
himself up to listen kindly, and to his relief he gathered from the
incoherent words that there was no great stain of crime, as he had
feared; but that the boy had come to open his eyes to the evils of
the life in which he had shared according to his age, and saw them in
their foulness, and with an agonised sense of shame and pollution.
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