e with all the force he could
summon, upon the upturned face that almost touched his own.

She staggered and fell: nearly blinded with the blood that rained down
from a deep gash in her forehead; but raising herself, with difficulty,
on her knees, drew from her bosom a white handkerchief--Rose Maylie's
own--and holding it up, in her folded hands, as high towards Heaven as
her feeble strength would allow, breathed one prayer for mercy to her
Maker.

It was a ghastly figure to look upon. The murderer staggering backward
to the wall, and shutting out the sight with his hand, seized a heavy
club and struck her down.

CHAPTER XLVIII

THE FLIGHT OF SIKES

Of all bad deeds that, under cover of the darkness, had been committed
within wide London's bounds since night hung over it, that was the
worst. Of all the horrors that rose with an ill scent upon the morning
air, that was the foulest and most cruel.

The sun--the bright sun, that brings back, not light alone, but new
life, and hope, and freshness to man--burst upon the crowded city in
clear and radiant glory. Through costly-coloured glass and
paper-mended window, through cathedral dome and rotten crevice, it shed
its equal ray. It lighted up the room where the murdered woman lay.
It did. He tried to shut it out, but it would stream in. If the sight
had been a ghastly one in the dull morning, what was it, now, in all
that brilliant light!

He had not moved; he had been afraid to stir. There had been a moan
and motion of the hand; and, with terror added to rage, he had struck
and struck again. Once he threw a rug over it; but it was worse to
fancy the eyes, and imagine them moving towards him, than to see them
glaring upward, as if watching the reflection of the pool of gore that
quivered and danced in the sunlight on the ceiling. He had plucked it
off again. And there was the body--mere flesh and blood, no more--but
such flesh, and so much blood!

He struck a light, kindled a fire, and thrust the club into it. There
was hair upon the end, which blazed and shrunk into a light cinder,
and, caught by the air, whirled up the chimney. Even that frightened
him, sturdy as he was; but he held the weapon till it broke, and then
piled it on the coals to burn away, and smoulder into ashes. He washed
himself, and rubbed his clothes; there were spots that would not be
removed, but he cut the pieces out, and burnt them. How those stains
were dispersed about th