“Is it poison!” exclaimed Albertine, gazing round upon the group--“Behold!”
And as he spoke, the hound Saladin fell stiffened and dead, upon the marble pavement, with a single fearful struggle, a single terrible howl.--His limbs were fearfully distorted, and his eyes were starting from their sockets, while a thin white foam hung round his serpent-like jaw.
A confused cry of horror thundered around the apartment, and then you might have heard the footsteps of the Invisible Death, all was so fearfully silent and still.
“As God lives, my father has been murdered!” shouted Adrian Di Albarone, as the expression of incredulity lately visible in his manly face changed to a look of pallid horror--“Now, by the Sacrament of God, he shall be avenged as never was murdered man avenged before! Who,” he shrieked in a husky voice, turning to the throng--“Who hath done this murder?”
“Sir Duke,” exclaimed Aldarin, as though he had not heard Adrian, “the encrusted substance which fell from the death-bowl may be poisonous--”
The small white ball, which the Duke had absently clenched in his fingers, fell to the floor, and every ear heard a ringing sound as it fell, and every eye beheld the fragments splintering as it touched the floor. The whole substance had vanished, and along the floor there rolled a massive signet ring, glittering with a single ruby.
The Duke of Florence stooped hastily and again grasped the ring; he held it aloft, and shouted, in a tone of amazement and horror--
“It is the ring of the murderer, dropped by accident into the death-bowl! It bears a crest and an inscription--look, Signor Aldarin--canst make out crest or inscription?”
“The crest, ’tis a Winged Leopard--the motto--‘_Grasp boldly, and bravely strike_!’ Both crest and motto are those of Albarone”--his voice sank to a death-like whisper--“Lord Adrian--behold--_it is, it is the signet-ring of Albarone_!”
Aldarin turned with a voice of fierce emphasis--
“Thy question has its answer--let the signet-ring tell the tale. Adrian, oh, Adrian,” he continued, as his voice changed with mingled compassion and anguish--“what moved thee to this fearful deed? Oh, that I, a weak old man, should live to see my brother’s son accused of that brother’s murder!”