Page:Rowland--The Mountain of Fears.djvu/168

This page needs to be proofread.

THE MOUNTAIN OF FEARS

thal smote the heavy door several times with the ball of his hand.

"'Jacob!' he called, softly. 'Jacob, Jacob, my dear little Jacob!' He leaped back and raised his pick; it seemed as if the sounds of his sick brother's distress had robbed him of his senses.

"I seized the pick, and he whirled on me with a snarl. Indeed, Doctor, the Jew was like a tigress who hears the wail of a captured cub.

" 'Idiot!' I whispered, 'do you want to rouse the garrison?'

" 'Listen!' said he, and raised his hand suddenly. I listened, and in a lull of the surf there reached our ears a series of pathetic sounds. You know the sound, Doctor; the feeble strangling of a pulmonary patient when too weak to cough, something between a cough and a rattle—and then it suddenly ceased and there came to our ears, in a voice as thin as a wafer's edge: 'Isidore!'

"And then Rosenthal went mad. He knew,

[ 152 ]