I had made, in the moment almost
of his death and across his body, my first acquaintance with passion.
My blood tingled yet with the strange fire; my mind ran in a tumult
of high resolves of which I understood neither the end nor the
present meaning, but only that the world had on a sudden become my
battlefield, that the fight was mine, and at all cost the victory
must be mine. It was, if I may say it without blasphemy, as if my
friend's blood had baptized me into his faith; and I saw life and
death with new eyes.
Yet, for the moment, in finding passion I had also found self; and
shame of this self dragged down my elation. I had sprung to my feet
in wild rage against Nat's murder; I had spoken words--fierce,
unpremeditated words--which, beginning in a boyish defiance, had
ended on a note which, though my own lips uttered it, I heard as from
a trumpet sounding close and yet calling afar. In a minute or so it
had happened, and behold! I that, sitting beside Nat, should have
been terribly alone, was not alone, for my new-found self sat between
us, intruding on my sorrow.
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