PAST MASTERS

THIRTY-FIVE

Contents

1: One Good Tern / Guy Gilpatric

2: The Lost Fetish of Walai / Charles J. Mansford

3: Captain Cronhelm's Blunder / J. L. Hornibrook

4: The Mysterious Card / Cleveland Moffett

5: The Eighth Green Man / G. G. Pendarves

6: The Dragoman's Slave Girl / Otis Adelbert Kline

7: The Cape Conspiracy / Owen Oliver

8: A Black Diamond / Marianne Kent

9: Eastern Guile / Leslie Beresford

10: Aurora's Treasure / Lady Gilbert

11: The Dancer's Mascot / Beatrice Heron-Maxwell

12: The Closed Door / Egerton Castle

13: Lord Hillayton's Settlement / Dorothea Conyers

14: The Four Invisibles / Egerton Castle

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1: One Good Tern

Guy Gilpatric

1896-1950

The Saturday Evening Post, Jan 14, 1933

THE SECOND EVENING out of Port Elizabeth the S.S. Inchcliffe Castle thrust her bluff snout around the Dark Continent's darkest corner and girded her rusty loins for a long trek up the West African coast. All afternoon, below Good Hope, she had wallowed along through a sea patrolled by gray waterspouts which stalked across the surface like errant ghosts of gnarled apple trees; but now, as she nosed northwestward, she was met by a gale that swept clear down from the Bight of Benin, bringing the hissing combers with it. She struggled past the lights of Cape Town and Stellenbosch, the seas smashing against her bows, rearing her backward and then sliding out from under, leaving her all a-smother forward and with her propeller racing futilely in the air. It was this latter circumstance, momentarily repeated, which aroused the indignation of Mr. Glencannon, the Chief Engineer. Giving over custody of the throttle to an assistant, he strode through the hot oily mists of the engine room and whistled into the speaking tube.

"Bridge, Sir," replied a distant piping voice like that of a ventriloquist's dummy talking in a trunk, "Quartermaster Birkett."

"Weel, jump off it and blost ye, Quartermoster Birkett!" bellowed Mr. Glencannon above the mighty whur-rum, whur-rum of the engines. "Tell the Mate I'll convairse wi' him, and be quick aboot it!"

After a due and dignified interval: "Chief Horfficer," shrilled a tinny tone which yet had in it the essence of pompous authority. "Wot the flyming 'ell's the matter down there now?"

"Matter?" repeated Mr. Glencannon. "Matter? Why nowt's the matter, ye swine, except that the whole dom coffee-mill is rising clear off the bed plates every time she pitches. No, nowt at a's the matter, except she's leaking steam at every pore, and the tail-shaft's due to snop at any minute. Oh, nowt's the matter beyant one or twa other little points such as hot bearings and sae forth, the whuch ye wudna onderstand e'en shud I expoond them fra' A to Izzard. The point is, will ye change the course and ease her off a bit before she tears her guts oot, or must I come up on the bridge i' pairson and tromple oot yere ain?"

There was a rattling in the tube as Mr. Montgomery cleared his throat. "Why, see 'ere, you ruddy Scotch walrus," he blustered, "I'm in charge hup 'ere, I am, and I warn yer to remember it. There's such a thing as discipline in the British Mercantile Marine, and the Board of Tryde will bear me hout! Now, let's just get this stryght; am I to hunderstand that you threaten me with physical wiolence hunless I halter the ship's course?"

"Aye!" screamed Mr. Glencannon, whacking on the mouthpiece of the tube with a spanner. "Boord o' Trade or no Boord o' Trade, if ye dinna slock her off i' the next twa minutes I'll come up there,' snotch oot yere liver and wade i' yere gore, e'en at the cost o' a black mark on my Certeeficate and the price o' a pair o' new carpet slippers!— There, noo; if it's a threat ye want, tak' that one and mak' the most o' it!" Muttering to himself he resumed his place at the throttle, but soon the mutters gave way to chuckles. The motion of the vessel was changing, there could be no doubt about it. A slow roll was combined with the pitch. No longer was it necessary to shut her down each time the stern lifted, for now the screw remained safely under water.

"Haw, the glaggie!" gloated Mr. Glencannon. "I knew he'd ease her off if I got eeloquent wi' him. But noo, I've no doot he'll run straight to the Captain wi' a-muckle o' tittle-tattle aboot Communism, mutiny and my threats to do him in. Weel, let him, let him!" He thumbed a charge of snuff into his nostrils, carefully dusted back into the box those fugitive particles which clung to his mustache, and dismissed Mr. Montgomery from his mind.

Something less than an hour later he had fought his way forward along the gale-lashed deck, turned into the saloon, nodded to the company and was attacking his third bowl of mutton broth with a sound not unlike that of the last few inches of water escaping down the waste pipe of a bathtub, when the door swung open to reveal a horrid specter. There, clutching at the door-frame, was Mr. Montgomery— nose bleeding copiously, both eyes rapidly becoming black, and head lolling about like that of a boxer still groggy from a knockout. At sight of Mr. Glencannon, however, he snapped up as though to a whiff of smelling salts.

"There 'e is!" he snarled, pointing an accusing finger."'E slugged me, 'e did, syme as 'e threatened! Yus, the ruddy coward— 'e lurked hout there on deck in the darkness and barshed me with a knuckleduster without a hinkling of warning. Well, I'll show him!"

He lurched forward, the light of battle glinting in his puffy eyes. Mr. Glencannon, armed with a soup ladle, arose to meet him. Fortunately, however, Captain Ball and the other officers intervened and pushed Mr. Montgomery into his chair. He bunched up his napkin and buried his nose in it, muttering darkly.

Captain Ball, snorting like a grampus, resumed his place at the head of the board and surveyed the company sternly. "Oh damme, now see here, gentlemen," he said. "This thing is serious, mighty serious! Horseplay of this kind don't go on any ship of mine, and I'll have you know it!— Did you slug Mister Montgomery like he says, Mister Glencannon, or didn't you?"

"No Sir," declared the Engineer, "I didna hae the pleasure. As a motter o' fact, and ye yersel' can bear me wutness, I've been sitting here at the supper table for the past ten minutes."

"H'm," mused Captain Ball, "so you have, 'pon my word, so you have. Well, I fancy that vindicators you, all right. But if you didn't do it, who did? What I mean is, somebody must have done it. Oh, by gosh, gentlemen, this thing's a mystery, ker-huff, I mean to say it's a mystery!"

"Mystery my eye!" growled Mr. Montgomery. "The Chief threatened to do me in less'n an hour ago, 'e did, and if it wasn't hactually 'im wot barshed me, it was somebody 'oo 'e 'ired and put hup to it."

"Haw!" scoffed the Engineer. "Yere theories are as quaint as yere appearance, the whuch, I micht add, is no only quaint but revolting. And as for my hiring somebody to clout ye— weel, ye scut, there's monny a mon besides mysel' who'd pay guid money for the preevilege!"

"Yes, but who did it, that's what I'm trying to find out?" persisted Captain Ball. "There couldn't have been another soul out there on deck, so far as I can figure. But then, I mean to say, it couldn't be a ghost that done it, could it now?"

"Lawks, it ruddy well didn't feel like one," sniffed the Mate.

Mr. Glencannon eyed him narrowly, and then gave vent to a chuckle. "Weel," he said, "if ye'll pairdon me for a bit, I think I can solve the mystery to the full satisfaction o' everybody." And tugging his flashlight from his hip pocket, he stepped out into the gale.

An uncomfortable silence fell around the table. "—Of course," Captain Ball explained ruminatively, "I really didn't mean I meant I thought it was a ghost, if you see what I mean. But I'm wondering now if maybe there ain't some sort of a mutiny brewing, what with all this Red impropaganda the papers is full of nowadays. What I mean is, we'd..."

The door banged open and in strode Mr. Glencannon, bearing the limp form of a large gray-and-white sea bird. "There!" he announced, laying it tenderly upon the table. "'Twas a storm-driven gull that hit ye, though at fairst, fra' the feathers that are still sticking to the front o' yere jocket, I was inclined to gi' the credit to an avenging angel."

"A gull!" cried Captain Ball delightedly. "A gull! Oh, Mister Montgomery— pardon my laughter, but if I was you, I'd jolly well be ashamed to ..."

The bird stirred slightly, and emitted a feeble but derisive "Kw-e-e!" Mr. Montgomery dashed down his napkin, sprang to his feet and reached across the table. "'Kw-e-e,' hey?" he rasped. "Well, I'll kwee yer, yer sneaky nose-bryking fish-chicken, yer! I'll wring yer bally neck, I will, and ..."

"Hands off, ye hulking loomp, ye!" shouted the Engineer. "If ye so much as touch yon birdie, I'll fix yere mug so's ye can whustle Cockney folk tunes into yere ain ear. Ho, shame, shame to ye, trying to vent yere nosty spleen upon a puir defeenseless doomb onimal!"

"Kw-e-e-e!" screamed the bird, pecking a V-shaped chunk out of Mr. Glencannon's forefinger. It struggled to its webbed feet and stood at the center of the table, ruffling its feathers and blinking its beady malevolent eyes.

Justly outraged by this display of ingratitude, Mr. Glencannon shook his fist in its face. "Noo, see here," he warned it. "Do ye be a bit more coorteous, ye oaf, or I'll hand ye ower to yon brute Montgomery to do wi' as he wills." By way of answer the bird tore a half-inch patch of horny epidermis from Mr. Glencannon's knuckle and ate it with gusto.

"Haw, haw!" exulted Mr. Montgomery, who by this time had succeeded in getting his nose under control. "Well, I fancy that there'll learn yer to hinterfere between a bloke and 'is revenge! Oh, I 'ope 'e pecks yer silly heyes hout, that's wot I 'opes!"

"—Yus, and I 'ope 'e chokes before 'e scoffs up the rest of that bacon," said Mr. Levy, the Wireless Operator, as ruefully he watched rasher after rasher being gobbled by the uninvited guest. "Good lawks, 'e goes arfter it like it was hactually fit to eat!"

"Hem, ker-huff, well I must say he's got a ripping appetite," commented Captain Ball. "The only thing is, I— whup! There, you see? What I was about to say, Mister Glencannon— don't you think you'd better get him off the table?"

"Aye, I do i' vurra deed, Sir," agreed Mr. Glencannon. "The only question is"— he considered his bleeding hands—"The only question is, how to gae aboot it?"

Captain Ball waved his napkin and slapped it brusquely upon the tablecloth. "Scat!" he ordered. "F-s-s-s! Come, come now, my feathered friend, down on the linoleum you go!"

"Kw-e-e!" shrieked the bird, half spreading his wings and darting toward the Captain so savagely that the gallant mariner sought shelter beneath the table.

"M'ybe 'e'll fly hout by 'imself," volunteered Mr. Swales, the Second Officer, opening the door. "Lively, there, my bucko. Hup! Jump to it! Smartly now!" The bird, however, seemed to prefer his present surroundings, especially the bacon, and fiercely resented all attempts to dislodge him.

"A-weel, pairhops we'd better let him stay," opined Mr. Glencannon prudently. "Speaking for mysel', I conseeder his attochment to us deeply touching. Also, I feel so much indebted to him for what he did to Muster Montgomery that I hereby offeecially adopt him. But look, gentlemen, look ye there!— Whatever is that little metal bracelet he's wearing on his ankle?"

"Oh, why by George!" exclaimed Captain Ball. "Maybe he's a kind of a carrier pigeon of some sort, what? Take it off him, Mister Glencannon, take it off him."

Wrapping his hand in a napkin, Mr. Glencannon extended it cautiously toward the bird's right leg, upon which glistened an inch-wide nickel band. There was a "Kwe-e-e!", a lightning lunge of the beak, and a contented gobbling sound as a strip of napkin and a fragment of thumbnail went down to join the bacon.

"Whurra, drot ye!" fumed Mr. Glencannon, thrusting his thumb into his mouth. "Weel, it's plain to be seen that we canna subdue this voracious beastie by ordinurra meethods. Jessup!" he beckoned the Steward, "Jessup, do ye gae aft to my room and fetch the bottle o' Duggan's Dew ye'll find beneath the bunk. Remeember, I ken to a drap how much remains i' it, sae mind that ye dinna fa' prey to teemptation!"

The bottle having arrived, Mr. Glencannon held it up to the light to gauge its contents, poured out a tumblerful, drank all but an inch, and then nodded his head as though satisfied.

"Noo then, gentlemen," he announced, "ye're aboot to wutness a meethod o' anesthetizing birds whuch was oreeginated by my late father— a mon sae tenderhearted that he cudna bear to inflict pain on ony living creature. The guid mon owned a chicken farm, and by this little trick he no' only succeeded i' dulling the senses o' his birdies to the horrors o' the axe, but i' improving their flavor as weel. Here, lad—" he sopped a bread crust in the whisky and waved it at the gull—"Catch!"

There was a snake-like extension of the neck and a snap of the beak as the crust was caught in mid air.

"Bravvio!" Mr. Glencannon applauded. "Ye dooned it lik' a mon! Come on, chum, hae another. I'll join ye i' this one!"

The bird had another, a third and a fourth without visible effect. At the fifth, however, he seemed to feel a sudden elation. With a raucous "Kwe-e-e!" he scurried the length of the table on his clumsy webbed feet, took wing, and hurtled about the room in a series of dizzy circles, like a Panama hat in a cyclone. Consternation ran high, but at the peak of it, he decided to come in for a landing. Unfortunately— and perhaps because he mistook the table-top for a smooth pool of water— he neglected to put his feet down, and so executed a violent front somersault of the type known in aviation parlance as a ground loop. He lay on his back kwe-e-ing happily, and paddling his feet in the air.

"There, he thinks he's swimming!" declared Mr. Glencannon, emerging from behind a chair. "Losh, how weel do I mind the evening i' the middle o' Piccadilly Circus when I was tuk the same way! But noo, do ye pass me yon foork, Muster MacQuayle, and I'll pry open the birdie's bracelet."

By this time the patient was slumbering peacefully, and the metal band was removed without incident. All gathered around as the Engineer held it under the lamp. Upon it, in minute letters, was engraved:—

$25 REWARD, U.S. CURRENCY

will be paid to finder sending following information:—

Where found?

When found?

Condition of bird?

MENTION NUMBER 71

Address: Curator, Ornithological Survey

Webster Island, Mass., U.S.A.

"'—Massachusetts, U.S.A.'?" repeated Captain Ball incredulously. "I mean to say, gentlemen, do you mean to say that there bird flew all the way from Massachusetts? Why, that's pretty near 8,000 miles, almost, whichever way you figure it!"

"Aye!" agreed Mr. Glencannon, gleefully. "And twunty-five dollars is pretty near twunty-five dollars whucheever way I feegure it, too!" He dropped the band into his pocket, and gathered up his bottle and the bird.

"Come on, swift bearer o' glod tidings!" he addressed it. "I must frame an eepistol to yon Yonkee curator to post at Swakopmund, and you must get some sleep. Aloss, puir beastie, I dinna doot ye'll be feeling vurra subnoormal i' the morning!"

ii

AS IN the course of the ensuing weeks the Inchcliffe Castle called at Mossamedes, Libreville, Lagos, Bathurst and Dakar, Mr. Glencannon's pampered gray mascot became more or less a part of the humdrum life aboardship, and more and more the bane of it. His favorite caprice was to roost on a davit or a ventilator cowl until he spied an enemy approaching on deck below; then, with a horrid scream of hate, he would fling himself downward and crash feet first into his prey— an experience, agreed those who underwent it, practically identical with encountering an Australian bushman's boomerang in full flight.

Although deeply attached to Mr. Glencannon and politely tolerant of Captain Ball, he held all the others in loathing and contempt. On several occasions his victims had succeeded in seizing him and throwing him over the side, but invariably, after a circle or two above the ship, he had returned aboard with a derisive Kweee! To Mr. Montgomery, he was especially antagonistic.

"Lawks, wot a narsty-tempered 'ellion!" the Mate complained to Mr. Levy, one day when the pair sat in the shade of the awning, watching the heat waves dance on the roofs of St. Louis de Senegal. "Larst night when I cyme orff watch, blarst me if I didn't catch 'im in my room eating hup a pile of temperance journals I subscribe to and which I treasure 'ighly. Drunk as a lord 'e was— yus, and ugly fighting drunk at that."

"Why didn't yer twist 'is perishing neck fer 'im?" inquired Mr. Levy.

"Hunh, m'ybe I didn't try— oh no, not arf! But just as I was habout to grarsp 'im, 'e leaps into the air like a ruddy fury, and first thing I knows, 'e's tore enough 'air out of my 'ead that you could stuff a mattress with it." He removed his cap and passed his hand tenderly over his lacerated scalp,

"Well, 'e done practically the syme thing to me," confessed Mr. Levy, "hup there in the Marconi room the hother night. Oh, now mind you, Mister Montgomery, I don't hobject to 'im 'opping habout on the tyble and walking orl hover my set, heven when I'm trying to send messages. But when 'e tykes to sneaking drinks hout of my jars of battery acid, well then, I s'y, 'e's going a bit too far!"

"'E is indeed!" agreed the Mate. "But yer see, Mister Levy, the 'ole trouble is the w'y that blarsted Scotchman drinks with 'im. The bird 'as simply got a fighting jag on orl the time, or else 'e's in the 'eadaches and hagonies of 'ell's own 'angover. Either w'y, of course, 'is temper's rotten ragged, and orl of us suffers in consequence."

"Yus!" said Mr. Levy with deep passion, at the same time fingering a half-healed triangular wound on the lobe of his left ear. "Yus, we suffers, we do, and orl the while that ruddy Scottish sot is looking forward to the twenty-five dollars that'll be w'yting fer 'im in London! Is that justice?— Now is it, I arsks you?"

Justice or not, the fact remained that two days after the ship tied up in Limehouse Commercial Docks, Mr. Glencannon found beside his place at table an envelope bearing the return address of the Department of Agriculture and the United States Government postal frank.

"Hoot!" he exclaimed, half to the company and half to the bird perched on his shoulder. "Here's my billyducks fra' the Yonkee fowl-fanciers! Haw, and look, look here, gentlemen— a twunty-dollar note and also a five, deescending on me lik' manna fra' the heavens! Ho, how pairfectly delichtfu'! But noo, what says the letter?"

As he scanned the communication, his face was wreathed in smiles. "Weel, weel, weel," he addressed the bird, who had hopped to the table and then to the floor beside his chair. "It appears fra' this that ye're no' an ordinurra seagull after a', but a Sterna hirundo, or tern. And that, gentlemen"— he painstakingly arranged his face for the delivery of a jest—"And that, gentlemen, prompts me to the vurra droll reemark— 'One good tern deesairves another.'— Tern. Haw, haw!— Tern, spelled t-e-r-n; oh losh, d'ye get it?"

With his right hand, he reached for the treasury notes to wave them triumphantly on high, but his fingers encountered only the vacant oilcloth. From his suddenly palsied left, the letter fluttered down like a falling leaf. His jaw dropped. Slowly, he shifted his gaze from the table to the floor in time to see the last corner of the five-dollar bill disappearing into the tern's greedy gullet. All that remained of the twenty was the steel-engraved left eye of President Andrew Jackson, which stared at him disdainfully from the linoleum.

Terrible, then, was the wrath of Glencannon! With a hoarse cry, he seized the bird by the feet. Oblivious of thrashing wings and lunging beak, he struggled out on deck and hurled the mascot skywards clear beyond the rim of the Inchcliffe Castle's sooty funnel.

For a moment the tern hovered there, Kwe-e-ing insolently. Suddenly, from the distance, came an answering Kwe-e-e. Mr. Glencannon turned and saw a T & O liner sliding seaward down the Reach, a lone gray bird dipping and wheeling across the suds of its wake. Even as he looked, the gray bird was joined by another, and then the pair of them faded away in the river mists.

iii

FIFTEEN DAYS had elapsed since the Inchcliffe Castle churned up into the Port of London— fifteen days throughout which, with much ado, profanity and perspiration, she had been groomed for another four months' tramp around the seas. This time, however, she was scheduled for a string of European ports—Baltic, Atlantic and Mediterranean— and though even the meanest of these would be paradise compared with the steaming miasmatic pestholes of West Africa, Mr. Glencannon's spirits were low.

Thoughts of his betrayal, of his gobbled twenty-five dollars, still rankled him bitterly. The unceasing jibes of his shipmates were like stings of thistles to his soul. When hopefully he sought surcease on shore he found that a monstrous governmental tyranny had advanced the closing hour of the pubs and increased the tax on whisky. For the first time in his career, he looked forward to being at sea again.

Thus, as on the evening of the sixteenth day the tug cast off her line and the Inchcliffe Castle slid out of the Estuary headed across for Rotterdam, Mr. Glencannon sat down to his supper with something like an appetite. He sniffed the salty breeze that blew in through the porthole, and found it good. But though avidly he forked four slabs of boiled beef onto his plate and harpooned two potatoes with a single masterly estocade of his knife, he was vaguely aware that something, something was lacking. His right shoulder felt light, uncomfortably light; it missed the friendly grip of web-joined claws. With a sigh, he turned his head and contemplated his right epaulette— vacant save for its quartet of gold stripes.

"Well, wot about it?" inquired Mr. Montgomery, who had been watching him narrowly. "Wot price yer ruddy fish-chicken tod'y?— Twenty-five dollars, per'aps?"

"Feesh-chicken?" repeated Mr. Glencannon, hastily concealing his grief behind an air of vapid innocence. "Twunty-five dollars? Oh, guid losh, Muster Montgomery— canna I sae much as conteemplate the dondruff on my shoulder-strop wi'oot ye rooshing to mercenurra conclusions?"

"No!" declared Mr. Montgomery, with the assurance of one who has his audience with him, "Gorblyme if you can! Oh, we've got the larff on you this time, my giddy Scotch bucko! Pooh pooh to you und yer ruddy nose-barshing bird and yer cheap tuppenny puns habout one good tern deserving hanother! We've got the larff on you, we 'ave, and now I'll tell yer 'ow!"

From his inside pocket he produced a letter and spread it flat upon the table.

"This 'ere," he explained, "is the letter yer got from the Yonkee bird people, and which yer dropped and fergot orl habout as soon as yer pet scoffed hup yer money. Remember?"

"Aye," nodded Mr. Glencannon, leaning forward attentively. "I remeember it only too weel!"

"Well, in this letter it says ... 'the bird recovered by you, Number 71, is the first of one 'undred similar terns, consecutively numbered and released, to be reported as found.'"

"Yes," said Mr. Glencannon, swallowing but not tasting half a boiled potato. "Pray gae on."

"Well," Mr. Montgomery resumed, "with orl this hinformytion to go by, wot d'yer suppose us fellow-sufferers done, hey? Why, I'll tell yer wot we done! Me and Mister Swales and Mister MacQuayle and Mister Levy, we heach of us wrote letters to this Yankee curator cove, telling 'im 'ow we'd picked hup banded terns in the different ports we're scheduled to call at on this voyage. Heach of us gyve different numbers. We 'anded our letters to chaps on other ships 'oo'll post 'em from the different ports before we get there. And so lyter on, when we call at Bremerhaven, Mister Swales will collect 'is twenty-five dollars, haddressed to Poste Lagernd; Mister Levy and Mister MacQuayle will get theirs in Bordeaux and Marseilles, care of Poste Restante; and for myself, I've only to go to the post horffice in Bilbao and arsk for a letter haddressed to Chauncey Montgomery, care Administracion de Correos, and grab my slice of good 'ard Yankee carsh. Ho, ho, ho! Oh, you think yer a clever bloke, don't yer?— One good turn deserves another, don't it? Well, 'ere's a good one yer've deserved for a long long time!"

A strange sound came from Mr. Glencannon's throat. His head sank forward on his breast. He rose to his feet and though with dignity he left the room, his step was like that of an aged and broken man. Here, it was apparent, walked a mortal whose burden was more than he could bear.

Once out upon the breeze-swept deck, however, he squared his shoulders and strode aft right briskly. Entering his room and bolting the door, he wrote four letters to the Postmasters of as many different foreign cities— letters which he signed, respectively, Chauncey Montgomery, G. Swales, Campbell MacQuayle, and A. Levy, The letters read:—

"Kindly forward all mail for me to No. 33

Kilmarnock Road, Milngavie, Scotland,

care of Mr. Colin Glencannon."

______________________

From the series "Gleams from the Dark Continent."

2: The Lost Fetish of Walai

Charles J. Mansford.

1863-1943

Strand Magazine, Nov 1895

"THE natives of Bornou evidently expect something disastrous will happen to us," I remarked to Denviers as we sat round the watch-fire one still night, a few months after our last adventure as recorded with the Dervishes. "Yet, so far, nothing unusual has occurred."

"It is strange how superstitious all these African tribes are," he answered, reflectively; "the natives who dwell round here have only to enter this tract of land to obtain everything they require ; the country is well wooded and game is plentiful enough— yet for some unaccountable reason they prefer to live on its borders in a state of semi-starvation. The whole matter is a complete riddle to me."

"The sahibs should not have ventured here; the natives are wise to avoid the place," interposed our Arab guide, as he glanced at us reprovingly from across the blazing embers.

"Of course you have found it all out, no doubt, Hassan," retorted Denviers, "and now you are eager to give us some explanation as fanciful as most of your yarns are. Well, what do the natives say concerning the place?"

The Arab shrugged his shoulders, then replied, shortly: " The sahib is incredulous— his slave wishes, therefore, to say nothing further."

I glanced at Hassan in surprise. "You don't surely mean to lose an opportunity of telling a story," I commented. "Never mind what has been said by Denviers ; let me, at all events, hear what the natives say."

"Knowing what is said about this tract of land, I tried to persuade the Englishmen from coming here, but in vain," Hassan answered. "For a week the camp has been made here that the sahibs' rifles may slay everything they see. Perhaps, when the pile of skins is sufficiently high the expedition will be resumed. Why should the dust of the sahibs' feet trouble them with what is declared to be an idle tale even before it is heard?"

"To-morrow we cross the sandy waste, yonder," said Kass, our chief Wadigo. "Tell the story, then, to-night, unless you fear to do so because of the part an Arab trader is said to have played in it."

It was no uncommon circumstance for Kass and Hassan to have a serious difference on some trivial matter, for the Arab usually treated our native followers with scant ceremony, while they, in turn, were naturally disposed to consider our grave guide as one of the oppressors of their race. To prevent any further discussion between them Denviers commanded Kass to be silent, and then, ignoring Hassan's protests, curtly bade the latter to commence his narrative. Complying with an air of reluctance, which was far from being real, the Arab began:—

"When Walai, the Kaffir, found the great, glittering fetish stone, the wet diggings of the south were only just becoming known, sahibs. He was the Kaffir boy, or servant, of two Boers who outspanned down by Spruit Drift. By some means he chanced to hear, long before the Boers did, of the treasures which were to be had for the seeking. Keeping the secret to himself, the Kaffir watched his opportunity, and one favourable night crept stealthily down to the water's edge. The only tool he had with which to dig was a knife, wide of haft and blade. Clearing away a portion of the soft soil above with his hands, the Kaffir worked steadily for several hours at his self-imposed task. Not that night, nor on the next, was his toil rewarded ; pebbles of almost every hue he found— the dull grey one he sought after he could not find. Then came a time when no moon shone ; and Walai, as several dark nights succeeded each other, wrapped himself in his kaross and dreamt of success. When again the moonlight flooded the veldt the Kaffir crawled out from the Boers' shanty, making once more for the spot he had chosen to test. Now, sahibs, hear what befell him.

"Knee-deep in the swiftly flowing river Walai stood, a blanket about his loins, his great form flung in a giant shadow upon the stretch of shore over which he bent as he worked. From the excavated spot the Kaffir drew forth a double handful of stones, and washed them in the running waters as carefully as he could. Then Walai stood erect, holding the pebbles so that the moonlight fell clear and full upon them. Sharp and discerning was the glance from the Kaffir's eyes as he looked the pebbles over. Tourmalines he saw, whose prisms, wet and glittering, shivered the moon's rays, lighting them up and flashing them back in hues brilliant and matchless; garnets indescribable were there; great yellow chrysolites and agates such as Africa alone produces, sahibs. One by one Walai dropped the pebbles into the stream again ; one by one till all were cast away, save a single common-looking stone, over which his fingers closed tightly as he held it there— for the Kaffir had found a great uncut diamond ! Forgetting everything but his good fortune, Walai gave forth a wild cry that reached far across the veldt. Checking himself he glanced fearfully round, thinking that in the moment of success he had betrayed his secret. Nothing was stirring, save the willows overhanging the river's brink, through which the night breeze sighed as it swept from across the great patches of grey and tawny veldt, rippled the river, and then was gone.

"The sahibs would think much of the diamond because of its value— to Walai, the Kaffir, from whom no one could buy such a treasure, it was more than a mere pebble; it was a fetish which would turn everything he attempted in his favour. No one could harm him ; nothing could cross his path, not even the shapeless forms which every Kaffir thinks he sees at times in the gloomy kloofs— such power indeed was claimed for the mysterious, protecting fetish— and Walai doubted nothing ! Day after day he spent all his available hours in roughly polishing the gem with a hard stone, such as those of his tribe have long used for the purpose. Then, one afternoon, something happened all unexpected.

"The two Boers, sahibs, suspecting something was amiss with their Kaffir boy, had watched him closely, but discovered nothing until, by chance, Walai was hurriedly bidden to saddle their steeds. The gem was in the Kaffir's hand, and, without venturing to thrust it in a clump of acacia beneath which it usually lay concealed, he quickly did the Boer's bidding. The first of them had mounted, and the Kaffir was holding the mane of the other's horse when the latter reared violently, and by some means the fetish was jerked from Walai's remaining hand upon the veldt. Forgetting everything but his loss, Walai snatched up the glittering gem— to find the unmounted Boer facing him with hand outstretched for the treasure. " 'Hand over whatever it is you have stolen,' the latter said shortly.

" 'The fetish is Walai's, he found it beside the river,' protested the Kaffir.

" 'So!' cried the Boer, who knew of the Kaffir superstition: ' You have a diamond there! Let me see it.'

"Walai attempted to resist, but the Boer caught the wrist of the closed hand and raised his riding-whip:—

" 'Come!' he exclaimed, impatiently; 'the diamond ! You are our Kaffir boy; whatever you have found is ours.'

"Walai's hand tightened over his treasure as the Boer, vexed at the Kaffir's obstinacy, brought down the heavy riding-whip upon the delinquent's naked shoulders. Quickly Walai shook the Boer off, caught the whip with his disengaged hand, and dealt the astonished Boer a heavy blow with the butt. Before the second Boer could interfere, the Kaffir deftly swung himself into the empty saddle, headed the horse for the fronting veldt, and dashed off, the mounted Boer in full pursuit. On, on the Kaffir urged his steed as he heard the thud of the following horse's hoofs close behind. Mile after mile the flight and chase were continued, till the grey veldt gave way to a dreary waste of red sand, relieved at times by patches of prickly acacia. Without lessening his horse's pace, the Kaffir managed to glance backward at his pursuer, and saw that the distance between them was if anything decreased. He answered the Boer's hoarse shout to stop with a sharp cry of defiance, and, securing his diamond in a fold of his kaross, clasped the horse's neck with both arms and urged the foam-bespattered beast onward. Again a shout rose from the Boer's lips, and Walai, raising his head slightly, saw where the veldt before him was cleft by the river. Would the Boer give up the chase? the Kaffir wondered, as he saw the danger which fronted him. He knew not; but, without checking his horse's speed, rode straight for the river.

"Turbid and swollen the great river ran, its channel full after the heavy rains, although the veldt seemed scorched on either side. Little bank was there; the water swirled and eddied against the foaming flanks of the Kaffir's horse as it quivered, plunged in, and made for the opposite bank. For a minute the Boer reined in his own steed on the brink to rest it, then resolutely followed the Kaffir. The current caught up riders and horses like straws, toyed with them, whirled them down mid-stream, till a great bend was reached; there the waters flung them on the bank they wished to reach, the Boer less than ten yards behind the pursued Walai. Not even then did the Kaffir give way, but still urged on his almost exhausted mount, the Boer's threats ringing idly in his ears. Away before them was a kloof; if Walai's steed could leap it the Kaffir knew pursuit would fail. He made for it over the intervening veldt.

"The sides of the kloof were almost perpendicular; far beneath scattered boulders of rock lay, half hidden by ragged herbage; on either sheer wall of stone nothing grew, not even a dwarfed bush of heath. Walai knew to the full the risk he ran, and that he would not be the first who had tried the leap and failed. After him, still resolutely pursuing, the Boer came as the Kaffir rode his beast at the kloof. The animal quivered with fear as it rose in the air above the yawning abyss— a second after both rider and steed were on the opposite side. For a few yards Walai's horse staggered on, then sank lifeless on the veldt. The Kaffir extricated himself from the fallen animal, and returned to the edge of the kloof. Opposite stood the Boer, dismounted, and rifle in hand. He covered the Kaffir instantly, but the weapon missed fire, for it was damp. Flinging the rifle down the kloof, the Boer mounted again and rode away— then wheeled round and urged his horse wildly forward. He, too, meant to leap the kloof. Walai sank down upon the veldt, then as he saw the horse bound forward he sprang up with a great cry, the weirdness and suddenness of which startled rider and steed. The horse's forelegs missed the rock beyond by the breadth of a hand ; Walai caught one brief glimpse of the Boer's horrified face, then ran from the spot as he heard the dull thud that came from below — the pursuit was over, and the Kaffir's fetish was safe."

"But about the Arab trader, Hassan," Denviers interposed;" Kass mentioned one— what had he to do with Walai's fetish ? "

"Patience, sahib, and you shall hear. Walai pushed on for several hours, then made his way into a cave, where he rested. Afterwards he rose and struck across the veldt once more, wandering on for several days, till at last he entered the land where those of his tribe dwelt. To the kraal of the chief he went, showed the fetish, and, declaring that he had returned to live among his people, demanded one of the chiefs daughters in marriage. The chief offered to exchange his daughter for the fetish, since Walai was unable to pay the number of head of cattle required, but the Kaffir refused. Once before he had made the request and been denied— whence he had hired himself to the Boers, who, however, managed to evade paying what they promised to Walai in return for his service's. The Kaffir, relying on the protection of the fetish, determined to have his way.

"One night, when the chief was away hunting with most of the braves of the kraal, the two lovers stole away from the rest of the tribe and struck into the wooded land beyond, where for days they hid, while the chief's head-men hunted for them in vain. When the search was over the two made a canoe of bark and passed down the river, hiding by day and continuing their journey by night, until an uninhabited territory was reached, where they dwelt undiscovered for a space of four years. All that time, by snares and his spear, Walai found food for the companion of his solitude. Then came a great year of drought, and the Kaffir was forced to follow far northward the birds and animals which furnished sustenance. Unhappily for Walai, he was injured in attacking some wild beast, so that for weeks he lay unable to move. Then it was that the Arab trader heard of him. A party in search of ivory was crossing that part of the continent when one of their number saw a native woman carrying a child. Pursuing her as she fled from him, the Arab trader, who had fitted out the expedition, saw the woman disappear behind some brush-wood. With two of his companions, whom he hastily summoned to his assistance, the Arab broke through the intervening brush-wood, and found facing him a cleft in the rising ground. Passing through this they entered a great cave, to find Walai lying helpless and the woman standing before him, the Kaffir's spear held threateningly in her hand. Finding no harm was intended, the spear was lowered, and the Arab, by much questioning, learnt the story of the fetish and the Kaffir's wanderings. Much as the Arab wished to see the diamond he restrained his impatience, and by the advice of one of his companions, hit upon a way in which to get possession of the gem."

Hassan stopped speaking, whereupon Denviers, who wished to hear the conclusion of our guide's story, remarked: —

"We sha'n't think any the worse of you because of what some Arab trader did, Hassan; you need not hesitate to tell us the rest."

"The sahib is lenient, the dust of his feet hastens to obey," Hassan replied. "Hear, then, what happened to Walai. The Arab explained how unwise it was for the Kaffirs to dwell as they did in a territory which was annually scoured for slaves. He offered them an opportunity to join his expedition, to which they eventually agreed. Soon Walai recovered and proved himself of great service to the Arab, so that he became much thought of by the natives who had been engaged in the prolonged expedition. Many times did Walai tell the story of the discovery of the fetish and his escape. from the Boers ; once he showed the great, glittering stone to those about him, the Arab looking on astonished at the size and beauty of the gem. Next day he importuned Walai to barter the fetish for some cattle, with several tusks of ivory added, but the Kaffir would not. Where the diamond was concealed, usually, no one knew; certain it was that Walai had it not upon his person, as the trader found out when too late. Somehow the Kaffir suspected he was to be deprived of the fetish, and once more he and the woman prepared for flight. Their plan was discovered, and the Arab, glad of an excuse to get the diamond, ordered the Kaffir to be seized and brought before him. Great of limb and stout of heart was Walai, a Kaffir, sahibs, who had the courage of a white man. With his heavy spear he fought those who overtook the fugitives before they had passed an arrow's flight from the camp. The Arab, waiting for the Kaffir to be brought back, saw only the woman and child— for Walai lay speared where the subservient natives had surrounded him. Not alone he fell, four others lay about him slain before the Kaffir's spear shivered on the shield of a fifth. Upon him the fetish could not be found; they searched the woman, but without success; then, by the Arab's order, she was left behind when the journey was continued, and for all the trader knew, Walai's fetish was lost."

"What, then, became of it, Hassan?" I asked. "Had the Kaffirs concealed it in the ground?"

"Not so," he replied, " the woman possessed it, as you shall hear. Now, sahibs, comes the strangest part of the story."

ii

"LEFT TO DIE in that great lone land, the Kaffir woman wandered aimlessly about trying to track out a path, and returning quite unintentionally to the same place time after time. At length she grew weary of making what was plainly a useless attempt, and, staying near the spot where Walai had been slain, she managed to live, it seems, for several months. One day she narrowly escaped being seen by a party of slavers, who encamped where the Arab had done. For two days the woman hid, but at last was forced to leave her place of concealment to search for food. From her luxuriant hair she first drew forth the diamond and fastened it about the neck of the child. Carefully as the Kaffir woman moved she was discovered, however, seized, and added to the gang of slaves already captured. Of the child she spoke not, nor saw it again ; to enslave it with herself she never once thought of doing.

"The natives say, sahibs, that at night the child woke, and, having gone out of the cave where the woman had hidden her offspring, wandered into the forest. There she saw two tawny whelps playing together in the moonlight. No fear the child knew of ought that lived ; quickly she ran forward and caught the nearer one, which seemed to her only a great playful thing, as it toyed with her in turn with its soft velvety paws as the child's arms clasped it about. Together all three sported until the silence of the night was broken by the roar of a lioness, at whose cry the whelps ceased to play as they ran towards her— the child, unconscious of danger, following. The great beast glared at the new-comer as it clasped one of the whelps once more and again played with it, then, disconcerted, slowly went up the glade, striking down the matted tangle of undergrowth, and leaving a trail, along which the child and the whelps went together."

"So you really think, Hassan," began Denviers, at the conclusion of a prolonged, incredulous whistle—

"The sahibs wished to hear what the natives declare concerning the place where we now are, and their slave is telling them," the Arab replied; then continuing, he added: "Nothing more was heard of the lost child or the fetish until a few years ago, when one of the natives chanced to come here hunting, even as the Englishmen are now doing. An intrepid hunter was he, to whom danger was pastime, death a thing to scorn: great was his spear and straight his cast of it ; second only to the chief of his tribe was he held as a brave. As I said, sahibs," Hassan went on, "the native came here to hunt. All one day he had followed the spoor of an elephant, whose tusks he coveted, but had not come upon. Towards afternoon his quick ears caught the sound of branches snapping somewhere ahead of him; then, suddenly, the animal he was tracking emerged into the open. Behind a tree the uttered native stood, backward he drew his spear, native then with a whirr it was cast forward quickly with all his force. The weapon caught the moving elephant full in the chest, whereupon, with a scream of pain, the animal charged blindly down the glade, then turning aside dashed into cover, the native closely pursuing. Suddenly the wounded beast gave vent to a second cry, and the man saw to his surprise that it had apparently trodden upon a lioness, which had fastened its claws and teeth in its fleshy neck. The elephant tried every expedient to shake its opponent off, which it at last succeeded in doing. Avoiding the infuriated animal's trunk and its varied attempts to kneel upon the lioness, the latter slipped agilely aside, then quickly renewed the attack. At last the greater beast appeared to acknowledge its defeat, for, getting free from its foe, it dashed away once more. The native, who expected an easy task now that the elephant was wounded and almost exhausted, cautiously followed. Not far had he gone when, turning round as he heard a crash in the dead-wood, he saw that the lioness was pursuing him, and stranger than all, from near where he stood irresolute, there emerged a woman whom the lioness made no attempt to touch.

"Down to the woman's waist fell her dishevelled hair, framing features dark and striking, but quite unlike the women of the native's tribe; supported from her left shoulder there hung about her a garb of antelope skins; in her right hand she carried a short spear, while before his astonished eyes their gleamed a wondrous stone hanging about the woman's dusky throat. A cry of surprise came from his lips as she pointed her spear at him. Even as the sound was the lioness sprang forward, and the needed all his skill as he slipped aside. Little more did he tell to those of his tribe on his return of the grim combat in which that day he had engaged— the rends and rips which scarred his limbs told silently the rest of the man's story as he sank down, nor spoke again; when another day came the man was dead. Long the chief discussed the strange account the tribe had heard from him who would speak no more; then the determination they arrived at was to scour the whole district and destroy all the beasts of prey there; the woman they decided to hunt down, so as to get from her the strange fetish stone of which their tribesman had spoken. Accordingly, they set out, but in spite of the most careful search, nothing was speared or snared of importance, although the tracks of the beasts of prey in search of which they went, were everywhere discernible. One of the natives, however, declared that he had caught sight of the woman, and despairing of overtaking her, he had hurled a spear at her, which missed its mark.

"After several days had been spent in their useless task, the natives returned discomfited to their tribe, thinking that the adventure was at an end. This was not so, sahibs, for, as often happens in the native settlements, the inclosure of the village one night was found broken in several places, and many of the cattle had disappeared. Men of the tribe were set to watch during the next night while the rest slept. At dawn the alarmed cries of men were heard, and those who ventured forth to see what had occurred, found the watchers beating off, as best they could, several lions which had entered the inclosure.

"Low burned the watch-fires, for, in the east, the dawn was stealing up grey and chill; shrouded in mist the forest was, the giant trees upon its borders looming hazily out of the enwrapping cerements which left them dripping and sparkling as the sun lifted itself above ; the horizon. The shouts of the natives, and the din which they raised as ! they beat their spears upon their shields, drove the beasts away, and as the braves pursued them to the edge of the forest and into it, they saw the woman darting from tree to tree — even her of whom the native who was mortally wounded had spoken. Time after time they could have brought her down with the cast of a spear, but the chief wished it not, but rather that she should be captured unharmed. Quickly their plan was formed, and spreading out first in a long line they ran on until, gradually drawing in towards each other those at the extremities of the line, a rough circle was formed, within which the woman was.

Running at tremendous speed, her hair floating in a mass behind her, with spear outstretched, the woman dashed at the nearest native, and, as he moment hesitating to oppose spear to spear, she darted by, the tribesmen following hard behind her. Through the forest they went, nor caught her up until they saw her disappear in the cleft of a rock which rose up before their eyes. Heeding nothing of possible danger, the natives followed, save two who chanced to be injured in that mad chase through the forest. When they came to the rock they searched for the cleft through which the woman and their companions had appeared to go, but found it not! From that day all those who had joined in the pursuit were lost to the rest of the tribe save these two alone. Returning, the men told their story, a fear coming upon those who were still left in the native village as they heard it. When night came again they raised huge fires of brushwood, which the women kept replenished as fast as the flames grew low, while the men, with their shields and spears held ready, stood in groups anxiously scanning the marge of the forest. All that night, and during many others, they watched, but nothing transpired. Never again was the village attacked as it had been that once; stranger than all else, neither the chief nor the braves who went with him ever returned. Many are the rumours current among the tribe as to what became of those who followed the woman about whose neck the fetish of Walai is. Mostly, the natives declare that those so strangely lost have become submissive to the one they pursued. It is even considered that under her guidance they invaded the land of another tribe, carrying back many slaves, from among whom they chose wives, and, making the rest do all the labour necessary, they pass their time in hunting and in learning to use the shield and spear more deftly than those of the tribe from which they were separated."

"How do the natives account for the knowledge they pretend to have of the doings of this strange tribe?"Denviers asked Hassan.

The Arab, who had a reply ready whenever the veracity of one of his yarns was questioned, replied, gravely:—

"Does the sahib suppose that none of the braves who were left of the original tribe had the curiosity or the courage to seek for some further information of the lost ones? If he thinks so, then is he in error, for various young chiefs, anxious to distinguish themselves among their tribesmen, have set out to discover, if possible, the entry through the rock such as is said to exist. Such of those who have gone on the quest by day have returned without discovering anything, but not so those who seek the place at night, for then the natives declare the way lies open. More than one chief has ventured to pass through it, and has told to the tribe the result of his search, disappointing enough, sahibs, and yet proving much, for on advancing a little way each has been driven back by the spear. Long has the present chief of the tribe, from whom the story has been learnt, endeavoured to rouse his braves to force a way into the land and abodes of the strange tribe, but in vain. The natives believe it is fated that they should not enter against the will of the one who rules by means of Walai's lost fetish, and in that the sahib's slave is in accord with them, for do not all those who are the faithful followers of the Great Prophet believe in fate, and are not the Arabs even wiser than such African tribes ? This is the reason why I have besought the sahibs not to stay here lest they, too, might see the wearer of the fetish, and, following her, become captives of her tribe, or even be slain. Since the hour when, against my wish, the Englishmen have encamped here, the latchet of their shoes has been in dread that some evil will surely befall them. To-morrow, ye say, we are to advance on our way; Hassan, their slave, will then indeed be glad."

"Do you happen to know where the rock is in which you say is the cleft that exists at times?" Denviers asked the Arab, ignoring the reference which the latter had made to his belief in fate, or Kismet, as he termed it.

"Why, sahib?" Hassan responded, answering one question with another.

"Because we should like to see it, that's all," Denviers returned, as he idly tossed a half-charred ember into the watch-fire. "So as to learn what became of the lost men of the tribe."

"You would never return alive; surely it would be madness to venture there," the Arab replied, as he raised his hands in expostulation.

"That remains to be seen. Where is the rock, Hassan?"

"Not one of the natives will show the way; Kass will not, and even I dare not."

"Then we will go alone— that shall not prevent us," my companion persisted. "You can await us here; all we require is the position of the place."

"I would not lead the sahibs into such danger by showing them, or even by speaking of the way."

"Very well, Hassan," Denviers responded. "I daresay Kass can direct us," and addressing himself to the Wadigo, he repeated the question. Kass rose from the place where he had been resting before the watch-fire, and gathering a little heap of soil, he flattened it down, after which he traced out upon it, after the manner of his tribe, a rough plan of the forest about us. We stooped over him as his spear-head marked out the direction necessary for us to take, then, when we considered his explanation sufficient for the discovery of the rock, we determined to await the morning before setting out to investigate the truth of what Hassan had learnt from the natives.

Little by little the hum of the voices of those talking over the watch-fires grew fainter and fainter; glancing at Denviers I saw he was asleep, and wrapping myself in one of the rugs which Hassan brought me from the tent, I followed his example. We were destined, however, to have a strange awakening.

iii

SOMEONE shook me roughly by the arm, and, glancing up sleepily, I saw the Arab bending over me, a look of fear marked plainly enough upon his usually immobile countenance.

"Wake, sahib, wake!" he cried, and, before I could recollect myself sufficiently to ask the reason why I had been disturbed, I felt the cold barrel of my rifle touch my hand, as Hassan exclaimed:—

"Look, we are attacked, and the natives have fled!"

I started from the ground and ran forward a few yards, where I saw, to my consternation, Kass the Wadigo lying motionless, face downwards, and with his arms flung wide apart. Over him crouched a lioness, the moonlight, which was breaking through a wide sweep of clouds, showing up the glare of the beast's eyes as Denviers knelt scarcely a dozen feet away, with his rifle levelled at the brute. For a moment I stood almost spellbound ; then, as the light of the moon was obscured, I heard the sharp ping of a bullet, followed by a roar which mingled with a cry from Denviers's lips. Forgetting all else but the danger of the two men, I hastily covered the intervening space, where I stumbled suddenly over the body of Denviers in the shifting light, and correctly surmised that he had missed his aim and been struck down by the infuriated beast. No sound came from his lips as I bent over him, wondering vaguely for the moment what had become of the lioness. Hassan was almost immediately at my side, and finding that Denviers was giving some signs of returning consciousness, I endeavoured to make out where the animal was which had struck him down.

Glancing behind where the watch-fire was still burning, I saw the lioness stealthily making its way past the spot, and with a cry to Hassan to see to Denviers and Kass, I dashed after the brute, determined to end its career. With a few easy bounds it vanished into the forest, where I pursued it. As the clouds drifted eastward I caught a glimpse of the lioness again, but did not think it advisable to try a shot in the uncertain light. After it I went, until, in the excitement of what had occurred, I found that I had got considerably away from the camp. Feeling tolerably sure that the natives who had been so easily scared away would return and assist Hassan with the injured men, I determined to go on, watching carefully for a chance to fire at the beast. Conscious that it was being followed, the lioness stopped more than once, then continued its retreat, until at last it came to a stand in a glade, where it was well exposed. Dropping down behind the trunk of a tree, which had been uprooted apparently in a storm, I rested my barrel upon it, and taking steady aim, fired. Careful as I thought I had been, the shot missed the lioness, which instantly bounded towards me. One leap it took, and then a second. Before me, in mid -air, the animal rose, and, with a final effort to bring it down, I emptied the contents of the second barrel into the brute's body as it loomed close before me. Down with a thud it fell ; for a moment it made one desperate effort to rise, then lay still. I advanced, and having noticed carefully the place where the animal lay, returned to my companion. Denviers was less injured than Kass, and even insisted on going with me to the spot where the cause of our night alarm lay dead; Hassan having tightly swathed a linen band about a rather bad gash in my companion's forehead. We had nearly reached the spot when a low cry broke upon our ears, and, as we glanced towards where it seemed to have come from, we saw, bending over the dead lioness, a native woman!

Denviers whispered to me to stand still, and together we watched the woman before us. Again we heard her cry, plaintive and scarcely human as it seemed to us, then slowly she rose and left the spot as we cautiously followed her. A few yards away she stopped and glanced back irresolutely at the body of the lioness. As she turned about, her quick ear caught the sound of the dead-wood snapping beneath our feet, and, before we could hide from her view, our presence was discovered!

Away the woman sped down the open glade, and, as the recollection of what the natives declared concerning her dawned upon me, I cried out to Denviers:—

"Come on, it almost seems as if Hassan's story were true!"

"We shall see," he answered, and without further attempts to converse we resolutely pursued the woman until we saw that we had reached the edge of the forest, and then, sheer and unscalable, there rose up before us a great wall of rock, towards which the one we were following ran at headlong speed. Clinging with her hands to tufts of verdure growing in the crevices of the rock, she drew herself up and disappeared in a cleft above us, which we could just discern. We slung our rifles upon our shoulders, and, after repeated failure to reach the spot we were making for, eventually succeeded. Behind a straggling, stunted tree, which had taken root there, we saw a gap, less than three feet high, through which we crawled for some distance, then entered what was apparently a great hollow in the rock. We could see nothing as we groped with our hands, striving to make out the shape of the cave in which we supposed we were. After lacerating our hands badly we got back to the part where the entrance of the cave was, and there we determined to await daylight. We sat talking together, for we were too excited to sleep, and as the darkness about us was at last dispelled, we saw how narrowly we had escaped death in entering that strange place.

Some dry material we found, arid this we succeeded in firing. As the tongues of flame rose up we saw that we were within a cave of considerable proportions, the roof and sides a mass of glittering stalactites. The forms which the latter had assumed were as varied as they were grotesque— to us it seemed as if only the hand of a sculptor could have fashioned the shapes we saw about us on every side. Great pillars rose, a mass of delicate tracery, till they touched the lofty roof. Arch upon arch, along the sides, we saw filled with the grotesque, unfinished forms of gigantic men and beasts. Across the central part there hung down what seemed to be a transparent curtain, its folds broken as though rent and decayed with age. Beyond it we passed, holding up some improvised torches, and saw before us the most curious shape of all which the stalactites had formed. With distorted limbs twisted about each other, two mighty figures of men seemed engaged in a struggle for life or death upon the edge of the rocky floor, for behind them the latter broke sheer away, leaving a great void. Glancing down we saw something more, and, stretching ourselves flat upon the rock, we peered over.

"If we had pursued the woman much further who led us here, that, too, would have been our fate," Denviers said to me as he pointed downward. "Fortunately, we waited till daylight reached the part of the cave we are in and helped us to find the material for the fire we have made."

"I can make nothing out below," I replied, straining my eyes to the utmost. My companion rose, and together we walked along the edge of the rock until we chanced to find a narrow ledge which led downward. Along this we went, using the utmost care, for sometimes it was scarcely a foot in width, and we had to press our bodies close to the wall of rock to steady ourselves. Without accident, however, we reached the spot we were making for, and there I saw, clearly enough, the reason of Denviers' remark. Into the cave, through which we had passed, she who wore the lost fetish of Walai had lured the natives who had determined to despoil her of it. Across the rough floor they had hurried on and on, till suddenly, without any suspicion of what fate awaited them, they had reached the edge of the chasm, and, unable to check their speed in time, they had fallen headlong into the abyss.

There lay the remains of the lost braves in every conceivable position, some still clutching their shields, not a few grasping in a skeleton hand the fragment of a broken spear! Over them we curiously bent, and, searching idly among the forms we saw, we recognised by the abundance of his tarnished adornments he who had been the chief Hassan described, the fanciful conclusion of the Arab's story being strangely marred by the grim reality which confronted us.

"Nothing but ill-luck seems to follow those who have attempted to get possession of the fetish," I remarked, as we entered into conversation again. My companion did not answer, for even as I spoke, from out the darkness which wrapped about the far part of the great hollow in which we were, a spear was deftly flung, which narrowly missed his head as it whizzed past.

"Look out, Harold!" he cried. "I'm afraid we haven't seen the end of this adventure." Scarcely were the words uttered when a second spear was cast at us, and, determined to get at nearer quarters with whoever was attacking us, we dashed forward into the gloom, and as we did so, out before us sprang the woman into whose strange haunt we had come. We tried to stop her, but evading our grasp she ran past us, reached the bottom of the narrow path down which we had passed, and quickly ran on, making for the upper part of the cave. Try as we did we could not come up with the barefooted, fleeing woman, who easily out-distanced us. We saw her stop at last, glancing back at us, half fearful and half curious, as we continued the pursuit. A minute after she disappeared. Following quickly down the long, rocky way, we found ourselves at last beside the waters of an arm of a lake which, studded with wooded islands, stretched placidly in front of us. Yet once more we were doomed to disappointment, for when we reached the shelving bank the woman was already upon the lake, thrusting forward a little boat made of bark, with a speed which showed practised hands. She raised an answering, mocking cry to that which rose from our lips when we found further pursuit was impossible, and then, as for a moment she ceased to urge her craft along, we saw, as the sun's rays caught it, flashing white against her dusky skin, the glittering fetish of Walai!

"Well," I said to Denviers, when we had reluctantly retraced our footsteps, and, after passing through the cave, had climbed down the rock which fronted the forest, "if that really is a diamond which the savage woman has about her throat, it seems a great pity such a gem should be lost to civilization."

"I am not so sure about that," he replied, "but here comes .Hassan, whose anxiety concerning us has brought him here. We can contradict him on one point at all events, which is, as to the end of the natives whom this strange woman is. reputed to still rule."

"Allah and Mahomet have preserved the sahibs," our grave guide remarked, after salaaming in his usual obsequious manner: "Did the Englishmen find the rock in which is the hidden cleft?"

Denviers answered in the affirmative, and stated that we had, moreover, seen the woman, whereupon the Arab quickly responded:—

"So the natives' story is true! Even the sahibs attest to it, although at first they were incredulous. Doubtless they succeeded in getting possession of the wonderful fetish ; shall their slave take care of it for them?"

Denviers looked into the Arab's face with an amused smile as he saw the latter holding out his hand expectantly for the fetish.

"Walai's treasure is still lost," he replied; "or, rather, the native woman has it still."

"For the sahibs not to secure the gem, even if it were necessary to slay the woman to get it, seems strange to their slave— what is a life, more or less, that Englishmen should hesitate?" Then convinced that to argue thematterfurtherwas futile, he added, philosophically: "Yet Allah's will is Allah's will, and the sahibs' slave is theirs always!"

All the same, however, our guide did not cease for several days to lament the lost diamond ; but, eventually, he consoled himself by weaving a fanciful story of the future history of the gem, stranger than the one we knew concerning it.

___________________

3: Captain Cronhelm's Blunder

J. L. Hornibrook

1862-1936

Strand Magazine, Nov 1895

WHEN the Cape steamer Iris was run down in the Channel, on a dark, blustering winter's night, the news of the collision created a profound sensation in the shipping world: not because the disaster resulted in any great loss of life, but that it was brought about by a singular error of judgment on the part of the commander, Captain Cronhelm. This one fatal mistake in his hitherto successful career— for, though still a young man, he was looked upon as one of the most skilful navigators of the day— would have been enough to blast his reputation had he lived to appear before a court of inquiry. But he did not survive the disaster; he disappeared from the bridge immediately after the Iris was struck, and was never seen again. The following story, extraordinary as it will doubtless appear, may afford some clue to the mystery, and help to clear his name from the slur cast upon it.

At the time of the collision, the Iris was homeward-bound from South Africa, having left Cape Town on the same day, and almost at the same hour, as the Dalhousie, of the Albion line. The vessels were pretty evenly matched as regards speed, and as it was an open secret that their steaming powers would be put to the test on this occasion, an exciting contest was anticipated. The two ships kept well together as far as the Canaries. The Dalhousie touched at Teneriffe, the Iris at Madeira. By a strange chance, they came abreast again off Cape Finisterre, and from thence it was a sort of neck-to-neck race for Southampton.

As they drew up towards the English coast, the Dalhousie forged ahead, and maintained her lead. It came on a wild night, pitchy dark, with heavy showers of sleet, and frequent flashes of lightning. After a time, the Albion liner signalled that she was about to alter her course, by passing from the port to the starboard side of the Iris. Captain Cronhelm immediately had his helm starboarded so as to bring his vessel out of a direct line with the other while she crossed his bows. Soon after this change of position was effected, the look-out on board the Iris reported a large sailing ship bearing down upon their port bow.

It ought to have been a comparatively easy matter to steer clear of her. Captain Cronhelm should have slowed down his engines until she had passed, or put his helm hard a-starboard, so as to get round under her stern. But, by some strange fatality, he held on his course until it was too late to avert the collision. The sailing ship— which proved to be the Crusader, of Cardiff— crashed into the steamer's forequarter, killing two of her crew, and injuring others.

One very singular circumstance— which, even amidst that appalling scene of darkness, terror, and confusion, did not escape notice— was the fact that Captain Cronhelm, a man noted for his coolness and presence of mind in the face of danger, should have lost his head so completely as to be utterly incapable of taking any steps to insure the safety of his passengers. When, as already stated, he disappeared from the bridge, the first officer, Mr. Eastlake, took command, and not only prevented an overcrowding of the boats, but succeeded in getting them clear of the ship before she sank. The boats were speedily picked up by the Crusader, and their occupants subsequently transferred to the Dalhousie, that vessel having put back to render assistance. All the passengers, as far as could be ascertained, were rescued, but eight of the crew, including the captain, were reported "missing."

The day following, I was sent off to the scene of the disaster, and went down to examine the sunken vessel. When I reached the bottom, and stood gazing up at the great, black hull towering above me, I couldn't help wondering what had occasioned the terrible blunder which sent this magnificent ship to her doom. The secret, whatever it might have been, was known only to the commander himself, and had perished with him.

So, at least, I thought at the time.

Judging by the size of the gaping hole in her side, the Iris must have been struck with tremendous force. I climbed, through the opening to examine the interior, and found she had been cut right across to the starboard bulwarks. I clambered up on deck, and there, entangled in a mass of wreckage, discovered the mangled bodies of the two seamen who were killed at the time of the collision.

With much difficulty I made my way aft, over the torn and shattered decks. I was anxious, if possible, to ascertain the fate of Captain Cronhelm. Perhaps the finding of his body might in some manner account for his sudden disappearance. I felt convinced he was not the man to desert his post in the moment of danger, unless it was absolutely out of his power to remain there.

Most of the deck-houses had been battered down, but one of them, close to the bridge, was still standing. From its position, I concluded it was the chart-room. As I held my lamp forward and glanced inside, I saw the figure of a man stretched full length upon the floor. It was the captain.

He was lying, face downwards, under the broken table, his head resting upon his arms, just as if he had fallen forward and made no effort either to regain his feet or struggle against the inrushing water. I bent down, pushed aside the table, and turned the dead man over on his back.

Good heavens! what impulse led me to touch him? The sight was enough to send me staggering back from his side. The features were swollen and distorted; the staring, bloodshot eyes still wore a look of the most intense horror and dismay, and there was a strange leaden hue in the face for which I could not account. Down the left cheek I noticed a zig-zag mark, as if the flesh had been seared with a hot iron. There was also an ugly wound in the forehead, which must have been caused by a fall.

What was the meaning of all this? Could it have resulted solely from the accident to the ship? No! That awful look in the dead man's eyes was due to some other cause. I was so shaken by the sight that I hastened to ascend, for I felt as if I could not remain down there any longer.

I returned on shore to make my report and await further instructions. That evening, as I sat in my room thinking the whole matter over, I was told that a gentleman had called, and wished to speak to me. When he was shown in, and I found him a complete stranger, I was rather at a loss to understand the motive of his visit.

"Can I have a few words with you?" he said, hastily. "I am Doctor Hamilton, the late surgeon of the Iris."

I noticed he was uneasy and preoccupied, and there was a troubled look in his eyes, as if he had something upon his mind that perplexed him.

"I heard you had been down to examine the ship," he went on, after a pause, taking a seat opposite me. "Might I ask if you came across the body of the captain?"

"Yes," I answered, wondering what was his reason for putting the question. "I was told to search for it, and—"

"Where did you find it? " he interrupted, quickly.

"In the chart-room. From the position of the body, I should say the captain was rendered insensible by a fall, just before the vessel went down."

"And the face— the face?" he cried, half rising from his seat.

"It was swollen and discoloured— almost black, in fact; the eyes wide open, and suffused with blood. There was a deep wound in the forehead, and a strange scar on the left cheek."

"Good heavens!" he muttered, sinking back in his chair, as if overcome by emotion of some sort.

I looked at him in amazement. His face was white, his hands trembled, and he appeared strangely agitated. "Can it be possible," I thought, "that he holds the clue to this mystery?" I waited anxiously for him to proceed.

"It was a sad affair altogether," he said, after a minute or two of silence, and I could see it cost him an effort to shake off his agitation. "There has been much comment upon the fact that the two steamers were engaged in a trial of speed, and a good deal of talk about 'reckless steaming.' Some have gone so far as to say that Captain Cronhelm was under the influence of drink at the time of the collision, but I have no hesitation in branding that as a falsehood. Though the facts are so strongly against him, I have reason to believe he could not be held responsible for the disaster."

"I have no wish to judge him," I replied; "but the general impression seems to be that he committed a grave blunder. I am inclined to think he would have found it difficult to clear himself had he lived."

"I am not so sure about that," the doctor said, thoughtfully. "Even as it is, if there were any means of sustaining my theory, I would not hesitate in making it public. Though it might cause a vast sensation, I am convinced the captain's conduct would be viewed in a very different light. But the facts upon which I base my belief are known only to myself and— well, there is one other, but I doubt whether she would come forward on his behalf."

He stood up, and took a few turns across the room, evidently much perplexed as to what course he should adopt. I saw he had some strange story to tell.

"Besides," he continued, dropping into his seat again, "if Captain Cronhelm himself could be consulted, he might wish me to maintain silence, preferring that a stigma should attach to his name, rather than have the secret of his life laid bare. Perhaps I am wrong in taking this view; at any rate, when you have heard the story, you will be in a better position to judge as to whether I am justified in withholding it.

"We left Cape Town," he began, "on Thursday afternoon, 23rd November, about an hour or so after the Dalhousie had sailed. Despite the time of year, we had a fair number of passengers, and the contest with the other steamer aroused much interest on board. The captain himself entered keenly into the spirit of the race, for he had all a sailor's pride in his vessel. Still, no one felt the least uneasiness as to the likelihood of any accident resulting from the proximity of the ships. Our commander, as I daresay you know, was renowned not alone for his skill, but for the extreme care he exercised on all occasions. He was the sort of man, too, to inspire a feeling of security even in the mind of the most timid and nervous passenger.

"It often struck me as strange that, though I had been with Captain Cronhelm nearly two years, I never met anyone who appeared upon intimate terms with him, or who had known him in his younger days. He never referred to the past himself, nor alluded to his relatives, if he had any. In fact, we knew absolutely nothing of his life outside our associations on board ship. At times he was subject to sudden strange fits of despondency— without any apparent cause— during which no one dared venture to disturb him, except in case of urgent necessity. In spite of all this, he was a man of high feeling, a thorough gentleman, and immensely popular. I have known people put off their return to England for a month or more, in order to secure a passage in his ship.

"Another strange fact about him was this: I had sailed with him for more than a year before I discovered that at one time he must have possessed a violent and ungovernable temper, so completely had he mastered it and kept it under control. Only once, in my experience of him, did his latent passion burst through restraint, and I shall never forget that scene. An able-bodied seaman was reported for refusing duty, and when brought before the commander, tried to brave the thing out by assuming an insolent demeanour. On being questioned, the fellow made some flippant reply, which I didn't quite catch. In an instant, without the slightest warning, the captain's features grew perfectly livid, the muscles of his face twitched horribly, and, in the first impulse of rage, he stretched the man at his feet, stunned and bleeding. But, as he turned from the spot, that sudden blaze of anger vanished from his face almost as quickly as it had come, and gave place to a look of profound and painful regret. He asked me, rather hurriedly, to ascertain if the man was much injured, and retired to his own cabin. Half an hour later, when I tapped at his door, I was startled by hearing a sound inside as of someone in pain. I opened the door gently, glanced around, and then hastily withdrew. Would you believe it? Captain Cronhelm was seated at the table, his head buried in his arms, positively groaning with anguish."

"A strange sort of man he must have been," I ventured to remark.

"I couldn't well understand it at the time," Dr. Hamilton replied, " but what transpired on our last voyage rather opened my eyes. We quickly overhauled the Dalhousie, and made a good run up to the Canaries, neither of the ships having gained much advantage so far. We touched, as you know, at Madeira, where we picked up a few extra passengers. Amongst the rest there were two ladies, for whom a special state-room had been reserved.

"I happened to be standing on deck when they came on board. I don't know how it was, but, from the very first moment, one of these ladies— the younger of the two— aroused my interest to such an extent that instinctively my eyes followed them until they disappeared from sight. This was the more singular, as I was totally unable to discern her features— for she wore a heavy veil; but there was something strikingly graceful and elegant in her tall figure that could not fail to attract attention. They went straight to their state-room, and did not appear in the saloon, as it seems they had stipulated for the utmost privacy.

"There is little doubt that, on an ordinary occasion, their presence on board under the circumstances would have caused some degree of sensation, but just then the general interest was wholly centered in the race with the Dalhousie, which served to draw off attention from the new arrivals. That same evening, after dark, I saw these two passengers come on deck, and— as I had already noticed— the younger lady appeared to lean rather helplessly upon the arm of her companion, and walked in an uncertain and hesitating sort of way, that somehow awakened in me a strange sense of pity, though I couldn't assign any cause for it. My interest in them led me to hunt up the purser, as I thought it likely he might be able to afford me some information. He told me they were described on the passenger list as Mrs. and Miss MacKinlay. That was all he knew; but our agent at Madeira had particularly requested him to see that their desire for seclusion was strictly respected.

"The following morning I noticed the elder lady on deck. She was alone. I observed her with some curiosity, feeling convinced there was a secret between those two women, which both guarded closely. Her appearance was in no way remarkable; in spite of her white hair, she seemed scarcely past middle age, but there was a sad and subdued look in her face, as of one accustomed to behold and sorrow over the suffering of others. I remarked that she paused frequently in her slow walk, passed her hand over her eyes, and stood for a few seconds gazing wistfully out to sea.

"While my attention was still directed upon her, Captain Cronhelm descended from the bridge, and walked aft. The moment the lady's eyes rested upon him, I saw her start, turn round hastily, and gaze after him in a half-frightened kind of way. It was plain that she had recognised him, but with a certain degree of uneasiness, almost amounting to dread. She left the deck hurriedly, and as she brushed past me I could see by her look that she was startled and agitated.

"As to the captain himself, he had not even glanced in her direction, and appeared wholly unconscious of having attracted her notice. I can't tell why, but I felt as if that sudden recognition— casual as it seemed— would, sooner or later, bring to light the secret which these women took such pains to conceal. Whatever it was, there could be little doubt that Captain Cronhelm was in some way connected with it. And yet it seemed by the merest chance that these three had been drawn together.

"Did you ever notice that people who have the strongest faith in presentiments are very frequently devoid of the slightest sense of danger, when it is actually impending? Such was the case with Captain Cronhelm. Like most sailors, he was inclined to be a bit superstitious, professed a belief in omens, and used to say if any accident ever befell his ship, he would certainly have a premonition of the coming disaster. And yet I don't think I ever saw him in such high spirits as on that particular day. To watch him chatting and laughing with the passengers, one would be led almost to believe that his sole care lay in the question as to whether or not the Iris would reach Southampton ahead of her rival.

"That evening we had a sort of impromptu concert in the saloon, and the decks were pretty well deserted in consequence. The captain, who went on the bridge immediately after dinner, had not yet returned ; but though the company eagerly awaited his presence, there was no lack of enjoyment for all that. About half-past eight I had occasion to visit one of the crew, whose hand had got badly crushed in a steam winch. I came back along the upper deck, and though the night was cold, loitered about a bit before descending to the saloon.

"Suddenly I became aware that I was not the only occupant of the deck. Through the open space between the deck-houses I saw two figures come into view straight opposite to where I was standing. They paused right before me, and I had little difficulty in recognising them as Mrs. MacKinlay and her niece (for that, I discovered, was their relationship). They seemed to be talking very earnestly, but just then a loud burst of music from the saloon completely drowned their voices. I noticed, however, that the younger lady appeared, by her animated gestures, to insist upon something which her companion strenuously opposed.

"While they were still engaged in the discussion, I heard foot-steps approaching the spot where they stood. Miss MacKinlay laid her hand upon her aunt's arm, as if to impose silence, and seemed to listen intently. Then, in a voice of intense emotion, she said:—

" 'Yes— he is coming— I know his step— lead me to him.'

"Her companion obeyed, but with evident reluctance, and both moved forward out of sight. You can imagine my feelings at the moment: prompted by an irresistible curiosity, I advanced around the intervening deck-house, and saw Captain Cronhelm returning from the bridge. It was he, then, whose step Miss MacKinlay had recognised.

"Standing rather in the background, I watched the two women approach the captain. As they drew near, he stepped politely to one side to allow them to pass. But, much to his surprise no doubt, instead of proceeding on their way, they stood still within a yard or so of him, in the full glare of the light from a window of the adjoining deck-house. Then I noticed that the tall lady still wore her thick veil.

"For some seconds the three remained silent and motionless. I stood looking on with rapt attention ; to me, at least, there was something almost painful in this suspense. The strains of music from the saloon, and the occasional bursts of applause, seemed to jar upon me. I felt as if the hush of awe would more befit the scene before me.

"Miss MacKinlay suddenly raised her hand, and the next moment her veil had disappeared. Good heavens! What a shock that sight gave me! Her face was frightfully scarred and seamed, as if it had been scathed by lightning, and her eyes were nothing but mere white, staring balls. I understood now the cause of that peculiarity in her walk. She was blind.

" 'Captain Cronherm,' she said, in a clear, steady voice, from which all trace of emotion seemed to have fled, 'it is, perhaps, only that you should be destined to gaze upon the havoc your hand has wrought; and that these lips, which have never since parted in a smile, should pronounce the judgment that will fall upon you. Look at this scarred and disfigured face: yours shall be the same. Look at these blasted, sightless eyes: yours shall be the same. You can never know the long days and nights of agony I endured: but your suffering, though brief; shall be terrible, for in it you will lose your name, your life, and your ship.' "

Dr. Hamilton paused, and wiped his forehead with a trembling hand. He asked me if I could get him a glass of water. I went to fetch it, and, when he had gulped it down, he resumed:—

"To my dying day I shall never forget those burning words— they seemed to fall from her lips almost unconsciously, as if she was under the spell of some prophetic power. Her utterances, too, did not betray either anger or enmity: tears, reproaches, bitterness, resentment, and wrath were all things of the past. Time might have taken the sting from her sorrow, but it left the certainty that a day of retribution would come sooner or later.

"When she ceased to speak, she turned slowly away, and with infinite sadness stretched out her arms in search of her companion, who had stood with her handkerchief to her face, sobbing bitterly. Silently they moved from the spot, and disappeared into the darkness. As to Captain Cronhelm, he remained in the same attitude— one hand clutching the taffrail, the other clenched by his side, while his body was thrown slightly back, as if the sight of that face had made him recoil in horror. During the whole interview he had never uttered a word, or allowed a sign of emotion to escape him. And yet what anguish he must have endured at that moment !

"For a minute or more he stood there like one rooted to the spot. Then his head dropped upon his breast, as if gloom and despair had settled upon his spirit, and he walked towards his cabin with a deeply dejected air. A sudden movement on my part attracted his attention for a moment, but he passed on without stopping. He was seen no more that night.

"I had little fancy, as you may imagine, for joining in the gaieties of the saloon, after the scene I had just witnessed. I paced the deck hurriedly to try and shake off the gloomy and distressing thoughts that oppressed me. But it was no use; everywhere I turned, that marred and blighted visage seemed to rise before me with painful persistency. Those few significant words— 'the havoc your hand has wrought'— surged through my brain, and vainly I endeavoured to extract their meaning. Strive as I might, no satisfactory interpretation presented itself to my mind.

"When I encountered Captain Cronhelm next morning, I noticed a marked change in his manner and appearance. His face had a careworn look, as if anguish or remorse had preyed upon his mind during the long hours of a sleepless night. The expression of his eyes shocked me: it was that of a man utterly hopeless as to the future, impressed with a sense of impending calamity which he is powerless to avert. He spoke in a constrained and listless sort of way, and to the many inquiries regarding his health, simply replied by saying, 'I have had a bad night; nothing more.'

"He remained on the bridge for several hours at a stretch, pacing restlessly from end to end. He had always maintained the strictest discipline on board his ship, but that day he strained it to actual harshness. It was easy to tell by the surprised looks of officers and crew they noticed something was amiss. More than once I heard the covert whisper, 'What's wrong with the skipper?' Which was generally answered by a silent shake of the head.

"This state of things continued until yesterday evening, when just as the daylight began to fade, we caught the first glimpse of the English coast. The sky had worn a threatening look all day; it was bitterly cold, and the glass fell rapidly. We came in for a few ugly squalls during the afternoon, that sent the water hissing on deck.

"Between eight and nine o'clock, the clouds seemed to gather and coalesce until they hung overhead like an immense black curtain. Presently, out of this inky blackness, the lightning shot; the crash and rumble of the thunder striking terror to the hearts of the timid. I put on a warm coat and went on deck, for a scene of this kind always had a strange sort of fascination for me.

"Very soon the sharp, cutting showers of sleet drove me to seek shelter under the lee of the deck-houses. Standing there, I could see Captain Cronhelm's dark figure upon the bridge, as he passed slowly from side to side. Every flash of lightning seemed to play around his tall form in a way that made me shudder. It was a positive relief when darkness again supervened, and I saw him resume his walk.

"At this time the Dalhousie was about a mile or so ahead. For some reason, her commander desired to alter his course, and, in case of any miscalculation, signalled his intention of taking the starboard side. She crossed our bows in an oblique line, Captain Cronhelm starboarding his helm until she had passed. Not long after this I saw the lights of the Crusader upon our port bow, but on account of the intense darkness and mist it was almost impossible to estimate her distance.

"It is my firm conviction that our commander not only was aware of her proximity, but had decided what measures it was necessary to take in order to avoid her. Just at this moment an intensely vivid flash rent the air, of such dazzling brilliancy that involuntarily I clapped my hand over my eyes. Almost instantaneously a cry so awful, so unearthly, that I could scarcely bring myself to believe it had proceeded from a human being, smote upon my ears. Looking up, I saw Captain Cronhelm stagger back against the rails of the bridge, his left hand clasped over his face, while he swung his right arm high in the air. The few others who beheld that sight are firmly convinced his sudden cry and wild actions were due to the fact that the lightning flash revealed to him the dangerous proximity of the sailing ship, and he saw a collision was inevitable. I alone hold a different view: I think, even then, it would have been possible to avert the disaster, and am persuaded the blame cannot justly be laid upon the commander."

"You believe, then—"

"I believe," said Dr. Hamilton, decisively, "from the moment he uttered that terrible cry, Captain Cronhelm was stone blind!"

"Good heavens ! " I cried, with a sort of chill running through me at the remembrance of the dead man's face. "It was just what that woman predicted!"

"Yes," the doctor replied, in a grave, sad kind of way, " there is no doubt upon my mind that the captain was not only blinded, but dazed— probably stunned— by the lightning flash. Call it chance, coincidence, or one of those mysterious dispensations for which neither you nor I can account, but every word of that terrible denunciation seems to have been fulfilled to the very letter. No wonder the man upon whom such a judgment had been pronounced should have uttered that appalling cry when the blow fell upon him! It would have been a mercy if it had killed him outright."

The doctor let his head fall upon his hand, and sat gazing moodily into the fire. As for me, my mind was so full of the strange story to which I had just listened that I scarcely heeded his presence. My thoughts were away with the dead man still lying in the chart-room of the sunken vessel. I understood now the cause of his seeming blunder; what I had myself seen and heard convinced me he had been the victim of a calamity, which, if it could be proved, would have exonerated him from blame. Was it merely an accident, or what had brought down such an awful judgment upon him?

"It almost seems a miracle that the disaster did not result in a frightful loss of life," I said, after a long pause. "The Crusader, too, must have been terribly battered about the bows; I wonder they managed to keep her afloat."

"The captain of the Dalhousie sent out tugs to her assistance the moment we reached Southampton," the doctor replied. "I believe they got her safely into port. Had the collision occurred a few hours later, when our passengers had retired to their berths, probably the greater number of them would have gone down with the ship. As it was, we had barely time to get clear of her before she sank. Only for the way Eastlake and the other officers kept their heads, there would certainly have been a panic, and a mad scramble for the boats."

"Were those two ladies rescued?"

"Yes. When the Iris was struck, my first thought was for their safety, and I dashed down to their state-room. You will scarcely believe it, but I found Mrs. MacKinlay vainly endeavouring to drag her companion on deck. The niece, who appeared strangely excited, positively refused to leave the ship. I told her the vessel was sinking; I pointed out that every moment was precious, and implored her to accompany us, but she would not stir. Fortunately one of the stewards came running past, and I called him to my assistance. We had actually to carry her up between us, but her strength suddenly gave way, and she fainted in our arms. I placed her in the same boat with her aunt. I have seen nothing of them since, though the second officer told me the boat was picked up all right. At any rate, I had fulfilled a promise made to Captain Cronhelm."

"He spoke to you about them, then?"

"He did. Only that very morning he called me into his cabin, and we had a long talk together. I think he must have been aware that I was present when he encountered the two ladies that night on deck, or else he felt the necessity of confiding in some one of his officers. He asked me, in the event of any accident to the ship, to go at once to their state-room, and do all in my power to render them assistance. I pledged my word to this effect, little dreaming at the time that I would be called upon to fulfil my promise before the day was out."

"Did he tell you who the ladies were, or how he came to be connected with them?"

"It is, perhaps, hardly fair to divulge his secret, but as you know so much already, I may as well repeat the rest, especially as he did not bind me to secrecy in any way. He spoke of a very tragic and melancholy occurrence that happened many years ago, and which had laid heavily upon his mind ever since. It was a sad story, known only to a few, who had good reasons for keeping it to themselves. Briefly, it was this:—

"Most people who knew him were unaware of the fact that at one time Captain Cronhelm was a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. The last ship in which he served was on the Australian Station. They had been out there nearly three years, and were daily expecting to be ordered home. It was just then the event occurred which blighted his career in the Navy, and left a lasting gloom upon his life. Though it was brought about solely by his own passionate temper, yet I cannot help feeling a certain amount of pity for him, knowing how bitterly he has expiated his fault.

"Some months before, he became acquainted with a Miss Mowbray, the daughter of a celebrated Melbourne physician. He met her at an afternoon entertainment on board his ship, where her name was in everybody's mouth. She was very young— only just come out, in fact— but her beauty had already caused somewhat of a sensation. She was quite the rage in Melbourne society at the time. Just think of it! That lady, 'the beautiful Miss Mowbray' as she was called, the girl so much admired, so much sought after, now strives to conceal her disfigured face, and hide her identity and misfortunes under her aunt's name. She is known as Miss MacKinlay— the one of whom we have just been speaking.

"There are some men who never strive so earnestly and recklessly to attain their object as when it seems beyond their reach, or when they have to contend against others. Without opposition, the pursuit would be robbed of half its attraction. Captain Cronhelm, in his younger days, must have been a man of this kind. To see this beautiful girl surrounded by admirers, to observe how they laboured and schemed to win her regard, was enough to fill him with a wild desire to outstrip them all, and carry off the prize. He set himself to accomplish this end; he seized every opportunity of seeing her; the admiration which she had first excited in him soon changed to a deeper feeling, and he loved her with all the force of his passionate nature. She did not remain long insensible to his devotion; little by little she gave way, and surrendered her heart to him. They became secretly engaged.

"Now that he had succeeded even beyond his expectations, one would have thought he ought to be supremely happy. But it was not so. His messmates spoke of him as a 'lucky fellow,' and he had to take their banter in good part. No one suspected what was raging in his mind, destroying his peace, robbing him of happiness, and inflicting incessant torment. It was jealousy: blind, insatiable, cruel jealousy!

"He begrudged every smile Miss Mowbray bestowed upon another; if she was out of his sight, he was tortured with the idea that someone else was usurping his place at her side. To stand by and watch her dance with one of his brother officers was more than he could endure. He wished her to refrain from the amusement altogether, and when she raised objections, he reproached her in bitter terms. The poor girl was wretched; she couldn't understand his violent hatred to every man who paid her the least attention, and many a pang his unjust suspicions must have cost her. They rarely met without a quarrel of some sort— ending in tears on her part, and in entreaties for forgiveness on his.

"One night there was a large ball at her father's house. Captain Cronhelm, of course, was invited ; but it so happened, owing to the absence of other officers on leave, duty compelled him to remain on the ship. As you may imagine, this was a sore trial and disappointment to him. As he paced the deck that night, chafing under the restraint, his thoughts kept wandering away to the ball-room. It was easy for him to picture the brilliant scene, but that was not enough. If he could only peep in, and see how she was occupied! Sometimes he thought of her sitting alone, sad and pensive, his absence making the room appear a blank to her. Then he saw her whirling around through the dance, laughing and chatting to her partner, without allowing a single regret to mar her enjoyment.

"Harassed by these distracting thoughts, he determined to ascertain the truth at all costs. It was a serious matter for him to leave the ship, but he would take the risk. He need not be away more than half an hour; he would just steal up to the house, peep in through one of the windows of the ball-room, and return immediately. If he were careful, there was little chance of his absence being detected. And, to heighten the temptation, there was a small boat lying alongside in which he could row ashore.

"He stole away from the ship without attracting notice, and reached the shore in safety. So far all had gone well. Dr. Mowbray's house was not more than five minutes' walk from the beach. It was a detached building, surrounded by neatly-trimmed grass plots, shrubs, and flower-beds. Captain Cronhelm had no difficulty in making his way through the grounds; the darkness of the night favoured his design, and he took care to avoid the stray couples who were strolling about in the open air.

"The ball-room windows were wide open. He did not approach too near, but stood in the background, partly concealed behind a shrub. In this position he had a good view of the dancers, as couple after couple went whirling past. He had not long to wait. Presently Miss Mowbray came round, dancing with a tall, handsome young fellow, with whom she seemed upon very friendly terms. Suddenly she paused, with a gesture of fatigue, and they drew aside towards the window. They stood there a minute or so, talking in an easy and familiar manner. The sight aroused the demon of jealousy in the heart of the man outside.

"They left the room together before the dance was concluded. Captain Cronhelm hastened round to the front entrance. He saw them cross the hall, and disappear through a door at the opposite side. Without a moment's hesitation, he followed. I really believe the man was not responsible for his actions just then.

"I can only give you a very brief account of the subsequent scene. It was too painful a subject for Captain Cronhelm to dwell upon, and I never saw anyone suffer such intense anguish as he did, when he came to this part of his story. He nearly broke down more than once.

"I gathered from what he said that he found himself in Dr. Mowbray's consulting-room. The young lady and her companion were busily engaged in examining some sketches that lay on a side-table. They both started as he entered; and no wonder— the look in his face must have been enough to frighten them. Without giving the girl time to utter a word, he poured forth a torrent of reproaches, bitterly upbraiding her with having deceived him. He remembered afterwards that she used the words 'cruel' and 'unjust,' but he paid little heed to them at the time.

"In the midst of this stormy scene, Miss Mowbray's companion turned to her and said:—

" 'Who is this fellow, Ethel?— will you allow me to pitch him out of doors?'

"If Captain Cronhelm retained any remnant of reason at that moment, it was swept away by those words. Mad with rage and jealousy, he seized the first object that came to his hand. It was a bottle, which stood on a table near him, and as he snatched it up to hurl at the man before him, Miss Mowbray sprang forward with a cry of terror. She was too late! The missile was thrown, and— oh, heavens!— it struck her full in the face! Her screams of agony rang through the house, for the bottle had contained sulphuric acid!

"The only thought in Captain Cronhelm's mind, when he saw what he had done, was to destroy himself. He sprang through the open window, and rushing towards the beach flung himself into the tide. The splash was heard by the occupants of a passing boat, who hurried to the spot, and tried to drag him out of the water. He fought against them like a maniac, he implored them to let him drown, and not until he was thoroughly exhausted did they succeed in getting him on board. They took him back to his ship, and for weeks he was laid down with brain fever.

"When he recovered consciousness, the vessel was on her way back to England. He lost his commission, and for a whole year lived like a hermit in a little seaside village. He told me he was often tempted to blot out the past by hurling himself over the cliffs. At last he made up his mind to go to sea again, and an old friend of his father's got him appointed to one of the Cape steamers."

"Did he ever hear of Miss Mowbray from the time he left Australia until they met on board the Iris?"

"I believe he did. It came round to him in some way that she had sailed for England after her father's death. He also learnt that the man whose presence led to the catastrophe was her cousin, who had only returned from an inland station that very morning. He was quite ignorant of the fact that Miss Mowbray had assumed her aunt's name, but whether or not he knew anything of the nature or extent of her injuries I am unable to say. However great his fault may have been," the doctor added, as he rose to go, "I am certain it preyed upon his mind all the years he was in the Cape service. That in itself was a heavy punishment, even if you do not regard his death as a part of the penalty."

_________________

4: The Mysterious Card

Cleveland Moffett

1863-1926

The Black Cat Feb 1896

RICHARD BURWELL, of New York, will never cease to regret that the French language was not made a part of his education.

This is why:

On the second evening after Burwell arrived in Paris, feeling lonely without his wife and daughter, who were still visiting a friend in London, his mind naturally turned to the theatre. So, after consulting the daily amusement calendar, he decided to visit the Folies Bergère, which he had heard of as one of the notable sights. During an intermission he went into the beautiful garden, where gay crowds were strolling among the flowers, and lights, and fountains. He had just seated himself at a little three-legged table, with a view to enjoying the novel scene, when his attention was attracted by a lovely woman, gowned strikingly, though in perfect taste, who passed near him, leaning on the arm of a gentleman. The only thing that he noticed about this gentleman was that he wore eye-glasses.

Now Burwell had never posed as a captivator of the fair sex, and could scarcely credit his eyes when the lady left the side of her escort and, turning back as if she had forgotten something, passed close by him, and deftly placed a card on his table. The card bore some French words written in purple ink, but, not knowing that language, he was unable to make out their meaning. The lady paid no further heed to him, but, rejoining the gentleman with the eye-glasses, swept out of the place with the grace and dignity of a princess. Burwell remained staring at the card.

Needless to say, he thought no more of the performance or of the other attractions about him. Everything seemed flat and tawdry compared with the radiant vision that had appeared and disappeared so mysteriously. His one desire now was to discover the meaning of the words written on the card.

Calling a fiácre, he drove to the Hôtel Continental, where he was staying. Proceeding directly to the office and taking the manager aside, Burwell asked if he would be kind enough to translate a few words of French into English. There were no more than twenty words in all.

"Why, certainly," said the manager, with French politeness, and cast his eyes over the card. As he read, his face grew rigid with astonishment, and, looking at his questioner sharply, he exclaimed: "Where did you get this, monsieur?"

Burwell started to explain, but was interrupted by: "That will do, that will do. You must leave the hotel."

"What do you mean?" asked the man from New York, in amazement.

"You must leave the hotel now— to-night— without fail," commanded the manager excitedly.

Now it was Burwell's turn to grow angry, and he declared heatedly that if he wasn't wanted in this hotel there were plenty of others in Paris where he would be welcome. And, with an assumption of dignity, but piqued at heart, he settled his bill, sent for his belongings, and drove up the Rue de la Paix to the Hôtel Bellevue, where he spent the night.

The next morning he met the proprietor, who seemed to be a good fellow, and, being inclined now to view the incident of the previous evening from its ridiculous side, Burwell explained what had befallen him, and was pleased to find a sympathetic listener.

"Why, the man was a fool," declared the proprietor. "Let me see the card; I will tell you what it means." But as he read, his face and manner changed instantly.

"This is a serious matter," he said sternly. "Now I understand why my confrère refused to entertain you. I regret, monsieur, but I shall be obliged to do as he did."

"What do you mean?"

"Simply that you cannot remain here."

With that he turned on his heel, and the indignant guest could not prevail upon him to give any explanation.

"We'll see about this," said Burwell, thoroughly angered.

It was now nearly noon, and the New Yorker remembered an engagement to lunch with a friend from Boston, who, with his family, was stopping at the Hôtel de l'Alma. With his luggage on the carriage, he ordered the cocher to drive directly there, determined to take counsel with his countryman before selecting new quarters. His friend was highly indignant when he heard the story— a fact that gave Burwell no little comfort, knowing, as he did, that the man was accustomed to foreign ways from long residence abroad.

"It is some silly mistake, my dear fellow; I wouldn't pay any attention to it. Just have your luggage taken down and stay here. It is a nice, homelike place, and it will be very jolly, all being together. But, first, let me prepare a little 'nerve settler' for you."

After the two had lingered a moment over their Manhattan cocktails, Burwell's friend excused himself to call the ladies. He had proceeded only two or three steps when he turned, and said: "Let's see that mysterious card that has raised all this row."

He had scarcely withdrawn it from Burwell's hand when he started back, and exclaimed:—

"Great God, man! Do you mean to say— this is simply—"

Then, with a sudden movement of his hand to his head, he left the room.

He was gone perhaps five minutes, and when he returned his face was white.

"I am awfully sorry," he said nervously; "but the ladies tell me they— that is, my wife— she has a frightful headache. You will have to excuse us from the lunch."

Instantly realizing that this was only a flimsy pretense, and deeply hurt by his friend's behaviour, the mystified man arose at once and left without another word. He was now determined to solve this mystery at any cost. What could be the meaning of the words on that infernal piece of pasteboard?

Profiting by his humiliating experiences, he took good care not to show the card to any one at the hotel where he now established himself,—a comfortable little place near the Grand Opera House.

All through the afternoon he thought of nothing but the card, and turned over in his mind various ways of learning its meaning without getting himself into further trouble. That evening he went again to the Folies Bergère in the hope of finding the mysterious woman, for he was now more than ever anxious to discover who she was. It even occurred to him that she might be one of those beautiful Nihilist conspirators, or, perhaps, a Russian spy, such as he had read of in novels. But he failed to find her, either then or on the three subsequent evenings which he passed in the same place. Meanwhile the card was burning in his pocket like a hot coal. He dreaded the thought of meeting anyone that he knew, while this horrible cloud hung over him. He bought a French-English dictionary and tried to pick out the meaning word by word, but failed. It was all Greek to him. For the first time in his life, Burwell regretted that he had not studied French at college.

After various vain attempts to either solve or forget the torturing riddle, he saw no other course than to lay the problem before a detective agency. He accordingly put his case in the hands of an agent de la sûreté who was recommended as a competent and trustworthy man. They had a talk together in a private room, and, of course, Burwell showed the card. To his relief, his adviser at least showed no sign of taking offence. Only he did not and would not explain what the words meant.

"It is better," he said, "that monsieur should not know the nature of this document for the present. I will do myself the honour to call upon monsieur to-morrow at his hotel, and then monsieur shall know everything."

"Then it is really serious?" asked the unfortunate man.

"Very serious," was the answer.

The next twenty-four hours Burwell passed in a fever of anxiety. As his mind conjured up one fearful possibility after another he deeply regretted that he had not torn up the miserable card at the start. He even seized it,— prepared to strip it into fragments, and so end the whole affair. And then his Yankee stubbornness again asserted itself, and he determined to see the thing out, come what might.

"After all," he reasoned, "it is no crime for a man to pick up a card that a lady drops on his table."

Crime or no crime, however, it looked very much as if he had committed some grave offence when, the next day, his detective drove up in a carriage, accompanied by a uniformed official, and requested the astounded American to accompany them to the police headquarters.

"What for?" he asked.

"It is only a formality," said the detective; and when Burwell still protested the man in uniform remarked: "You'd better come quietly, monsieur; you will have to come, anyway."

An hour later, after severe cross-examination by another official, who demanded many facts about the New Yorker's age, place of birth, residence, occupation, etc., the bewildered man found himself in the Conciergerie prison. Why he was there or what was about to befall him Burwell had no means of knowing; but before the day was over he succeeded in having a message sent to the American Legation, where he demanded immediate protection as a citizen of the United States. It was not until evening, however, that the Secretary of Legation, a consequential person, called at the prison. There followed a stormy interview, in which the prisoner used some strong language, the French officers gesticulated violently and talked very fast, and the Secretary calmly listened to both sides, said little, and smoked a good cigar.

"I will lay your case before the American minister," he said as he rose to go, "and let you know the result to-morrow."

"But this is an outrage. Do you mean to say—" Before he could finish, however, the Secretary, with a strangely suspicious glance, turned and left the room.

That night Burwell slept in a cell.

The next morning he received another visit from the non-committal Secretary, who informed him that matters had been arranged, and that he would be set at liberty forthwith.

"I must tell you, though," he said, "that I have had great difficulty in accomplishing this, and your liberty is granted only on condition that you leave the country within twenty-four hours, and never under any conditions return."

Burwell stormed, raged, and pleaded; but it availed nothing. The Secretary was inexorable, and yet he positively refused to throw any light upon the causes of this monstrous injustice.

"Here is your card," he said, handing him a large envelope closed with the seal of Legation. "I advise you to burn it and never refer to the matter again."

That night the ill-fated man took the train for London, his heart consumed by hatred for the whole French nation, together with a burning desire for vengeance. He wired his wife to meet him at the station, and for a long time debated with himself whether he should at once tell her the sickening truth. In the end he decided that it was better to keep silent. No sooner, however, had she seen him than her woman's instinct told her that he was labouring under some mental strain. And he saw in a moment that to withhold from her his burning secret was impossible, especially when she began to talk of the trip they had planned through France. Of course no trivial reason would satisfy her for his refusal to make this trip, since they had been looking forward to it for years; and yet it was impossible now for him to set foot on French soil.

So he finally told her the whole story, she laughing and weeping in turn. To her, as to him, it seemed incredible that such overwhelming disasters could have grown out of so small a cause, and, being a fluent French scholar, she demanded a sight of the fatal piece of pasteboard. In vain her husband tried to divert her by proposing a trip through Italy. She would consent to nothing until she had seen the mysterious card which Burwell was now convinced he ought long ago to have destroyed. After refusing for awhile to let her see it, he finally yielded. But, although he had learned to dread the consequences of showing that cursed card, he was little prepared for what followed. She read it turned pale, gasped for breath, and nearly fell to the floor.

"I told you not to read it," he said; and then, growing tender at the sight of her distress, he took her hand in his and begged her to be calm. "At least tell me what the thing means," he said. "We can bear it together; you surely can trust me."

But she, as if stung by rage, pushed him from her and declared, in a tone such as he had never heard from her before, that never, never again would she live with him. "You are a monster!" she exclaimed. And those were the last words he heard from her lips.

Failing utterly in all efforts at reconciliation, the half-crazed man took the first steamer for New York, having suffered in scarcely a fortnight more than in all his previous life. His whole pleasure trip had been ruined, he had failed to consummate important business arrangements, and now he saw his home broken up and his happiness ruined. During the voyage he scarcely left his stateroom, but lay there prostrated with agony. In this black despondency the one thing that sustained him was the thought of meeting his partner, Jack Evelyth, the friend of his boyhood, the sharer of his success, the bravest, most loyal fellow in the world. In the face of even the most damning circumstances, he felt that Evelyth's rugged common sense would evolve some way of escape from this hideous nightmare. Upon landing at New York he hardly waited for the gang-plank to be lowered before he rushed on shore and grasped the hand of his partner, who was waiting on the wharf.

"Jack," was his first word, "I am in dreadful trouble, and you are the only man in the world who can help me."

An hour later Burwell sat at his friend's dinner table, talking over the situation.

Evelyth was all kindness, and several times as he listened to Burwell's story his eyes filled with tears.

"It does not seem possible, Richard," he said, "that such things can be; but I will stand by you; we will fight it out together. But we cannot strike in the dark. Let me see this card."

"There is the damned thing," Burwell said, throwing it on the table.

Evelyth opened the envelope, took out the card, and fixed his eyes on the sprawling purple characters.

"Can you read it?" Burwell asked excitedly.

"Perfectly," his partner said. The next moment he turned pale, and his voice broke. Then he clasped the tortured man's hand in his with a strong grip. "Richard," he said slowly, "if my only child had been brought here dead it would not have caused me more sorrow than this does. You have brought me the worst news one man could bring another."

His agitation and genuine suffering affected Burwell like a death sentence.

"Speak, man," he cried; "do not spare me. I can bear anything rather than this awful uncertainty. Tell me what the card means."

Evelyth took a swallow of brandy and sat with head bent on his clasped hands.

"No, I can't do it; there are some things a man must not do."

Then he was silent again, his brows knitted. Finally he said solemnly:—

"No, I can't see any other way out of it. We have been true to each other all our lives; we have worked together and looked forward to never separating. I would rather fail and die than see this happen. But we have got to separate, old friend; we have got to separate."

They sat there talking until late into the night. But nothing that Burwell could do or say availed against his friend's decision. There was nothing for it but that Evelyth should buy his partner's share of the business or that Burwell buy out the other. The man was more than fair in the financial proposition he made; he was generous, as he always had been, but his determination was inflexible; the two must separate. And they did.

With his old partner's desertion, it seemed to Burwell that the world was leagued against him. It was only three weeks from the day on which he had received the mysterious card; yet in that time he had lost all that he valued in the world,— wife, friends, and business. What next to do with the fatal card was the sickening problem that now possessed him.

He dared not show it; yet he dared not destroy it. He loathed it; yet he could not let it go from his possession. Upon returning to his house he locked the accursed thing away in his safe as if it had been a package of dynamite or a bottle of deadly poison. Yet not a day passed that he did not open the drawer where the thing was kept and scan with loathing the mysterious purple scrawl.

In desperation he finally made up his mind to take up the study of the language in which the hateful thing was written. And still he dreaded the approach of the day when he should decipher its awful meaning.

One afternoon, less than a week after his arrival in New York, as he was crossing Twenty-third Street on the way to his French teacher, he saw a carriage rolling up Broadway. In the carriage was a face that caught his attention like a flash. As he looked again he recognized the woman who had been the cause of his undoing. Instantly he sprang into another cab and ordered the driver to follow after. He found the house where she was living. He called there several times; but always received the same reply, that she was too much engaged to see anyone. Next he was told that she was ill, and on the following day the servant said she was much worse. Three physicians had been summoned in consultation. He sought out one of these and told him it was a matter of life or death that he see this woman. The doctor was a kindly man and promised to assist him. Through his influence, it came about that on that very night Burwell stood by the bedside of this mysterious woman. She was beautiful still, though her face was worn with illness.

"Do you recognize me?" he asked tremblingly, as he leaned over the bed, clutching in one hand an envelope containing the mysterious card. "Do you remember seeing me at the Folies Bergère a month ago?"

"Yes," she murmured, after a moment's study of his face; and he noted with relief that she spoke English.

"Then, for God's sake, tell me, what does it all mean?" he gasped, quivering with excitement.

"I gave you the card because I wanted you to— to—"

Here a terrible spasm of coughing shook her whole body, and she fell back exhausted.

An agonizing despair tugged at Burwell's heart. Frantically snatching the card from its envelope, he held it close to the woman's face.

"Tell me! Tell me!"

With a supreme effort, the pale figure slowly raised itself on the pillow, its fingers clutching at the counterpane.

Then the sunken eyes fluttered— forced themselves open— and stared in stony amazement upon the fatal card, while the trembling lips moved noiselessly, as if in an attempt to speak. As Burwell, choking with eagerness, bent his head slowly to hers, a suggestion of a smile flickered across the woman's face. Again the mouth quivered, the man's head bent nearer and nearer to hers, his eyes riveted upon the lips. Then, as if to aid her in deciphering the mystery, he turned his eyes to the card.

With a cry of horror he sprang to his feet, his eyeballs starting from their sockets. Almost at the same moment the woman fell heavily upon the pillow.

Every vestige of the writing had faded! The card was blank!

The woman lay there dead.

II: The Card Unveiled

NO PHYSICIAN was ever more scrupulous than I have been, during my thirty years of practice, in observing the code of professional secrecy; and it is only for grave reasons, partly in the interests of medical science, largely as a warning to intelligent people, that I place upon record the following statements.

One morning a gentleman called at my offices to consult me about some nervous trouble. From the moment I saw him, the man made a deep impression on me, not so much by the pallor and worn look of his face as by a certain intense sadness in his eyes, as if all hope had gone out of his life. I wrote a prescription for him, and advised him to try the benefits of an ocean voyage. He seemed to shiver at the idea, and said that he had been abroad too much, already.

As he handed me my fee, my eye fell upon the palm of his hand, and I saw there, plainly marked on the Mount of Saturn, a cross surrounded by two circles. I should explain that for the greater part of my life I have been a constant and enthusiastic student of palmistry. During my travels in the Orient, after taking my degree, I spent months studying this fascinating art at the best sources of information in the world. I have read everything published on palmistry in every known language, and my library on the subject is perhaps the most complete in existence. In my time I have examined at least fourteen thousand palms, and taken casts of many of the more interesting of them. But I had never seen such a palm as this; at least, never but once, and the horror of the case was so great that I shudder even now when I call it to mind.

"Pardon me," I said, keeping the patient's hand in mine, "would you let me look at your palm?"

I tried to speak indifferently, as if the matter were of small consequence, and for some moments I bent over the hand in silence. Then, taking a magnifying glass from my desk, I looked at it still more closely. I was not mistaken; here was indeed the sinister double circle on Saturn's mount, with the cross inside,—a marking so rare as to portend some stupendous destiny of good or evil, more probably the latter.

I saw that the man was uneasy under my scrutiny, and, presently, with some hesitation, as if mustering courage, he asked: "Is there anything remarkable about my hand?"

"Yes," I said, "there is. Tell me, did not something very unusual, something very horrible, happen to you about ten or eleven years ago?"

I saw by the way the man started that I had struck near the mark, and, studying the stream of fine lines that crossed his lifeline from the Mount of Venus, I added: "Were you not in some foreign country at that time?"

The man's face blanched, but he only looked at me steadily out of those mournful eyes. Now I took his other hand, and compared the two, line by line, mount by mount, noting the short square fingers, the heavy thumb, with amazing willpower in its upper joint, and gazing again and again at that ominous sign on Saturn.

"Your life has been strangely unhappy, your years have been clouded by some evil influence."

"My God," he said weakly, sinking into a chair, "how can you know these things?"

"It is easy to know what one sees," I said, and tried to draw him out about his past, but the words seemed to stick in his throat.

"I will come back and talk to you again," he said, and he went away without giving me his name or any revelation of his life.

Several times he called during subsequent weeks, and gradually seemed to take on a measure of confidence in my presence. He would talk freely of his physical condition, which seemed to cause him much anxiety. He even insisted upon my making the most careful examination of all his organs, especially of his eyes, which, he said, had troubled him at various times. Upon making the usual tests, I found that he was suffering from a most uncommon form of colour blindness, that seemed to vary in its manifestations, and to be connected with certain hallucinations or abnormal mental states which recurred periodically, and about which I had great difficulty in persuading him to speak. At each visit I took occasion to study his hand anew, and each reading of the palm gave me stronger conviction that here was a life mystery that would abundantly repay any pains taken in unravelling it.

While I was in this state of mind, consumed with a desire to know more of my unhappy acquaintance and yet not daring to press him with questions, there came a tragic happening that revealed to me with startling suddenness the secret I was bent on knowing. One night, very late,— in fact it was about four o'clock in the morning,— I received an urgent summons to the bedside of a man who had been shot. As I bent over him I saw that it was my friend, and for the first time I realized that he was a man of wealth and position, for he lived in a beautifully furnished house filled with art treasures and looked after by a retinue of servants. From one of these I learned that he was Richard Burwell, one of New York's most respected citizens— in fact, one of her best-known philanthropists, a man who for years had devoted his life and fortune to good works among the poor.

But what most excited my surprise was the presence in the house of two officers, who informed me that Mr. Burwell was under arrest, charged with murder. The officers assured me that it was only out of deference to his well-known standing in the community that the prisoner had been allowed the privilege of receiving medical treatment in his own home; their orders were peremptory to keep him under close surveillance.

Giving no time to further questionings, I at once proceeded to examine the injured man, and found that he was suffering from a bullet wound in the back at about the height of the fifth rib. On probing for the bullet, I found that it had lodged near the heart, and decided that it would be exceedingly dangerous to try to remove it immediately. So I contented myself with administering a sleeping potion.

As soon as I was free to leave Burwell's bedside I returned to the officers and obtained from them details of what had happened. A woman's body had been found a few hours before, shockingly mutilated, on Water Street, one of the dark ways in the swarming region along the river front. It had been found at about two o'clock in the morning by some printers from the office of the Courier des Etats Unis, who, in coming from their work, had heard cries of distress and hurried to the rescue. As they drew near they saw a man spring away from something huddled on the sidewalk, and plunge into the shadows of the night, running from them at full speed.

Suspecting at once that here was the mysterious assassin so long vainly sought for many similar crimes, they dashed after the fleeing man, who darted right and left through the maze of dark streets, giving out little cries like a squirrel as he ran. Seeing that they were losing ground, one of the printers fired at the fleeing shadow, his shot being followed by a scream of pain, and hurrying up they found a man writhing on the ground. The man was Richard Burwell.

The news that my sad-faced friend had been implicated in such a revolting occurrence shocked me inexpressibly, and I was greatly relieved the next day to learn from the papers that a most unfortunate mistake had been made. The evidence given before the coroner's jury was such as to abundantly exonerate Burwell from all shadow of guilt. The man's own testimony, taken at his bedside, was in itself almost conclusive in his favour. When asked to explain his presence so late at night in such a part of the city, Burwell stated that he had spent the evening at the Florence Mission, where he had made an address to some unfortunates gathered there, and that later he had gone with a young missionary worker to visit a woman living on Frankfort Street, who was dying of consumption. This statement was borne out by the missionary worker himself, who testified that Burwell had been most tender in his ministrations to the poor woman and had not left her until death had relieved her sufferings.

Another point which made it plain that the printers had mistaken their man in the darkness, was the statement made by all of them that, as they came running up, they had overheard some words spoken by the murderer, and that these words were in their own language, French. Now it was shown conclusively that Burwell did not know the French language, that indeed he had not even an elementary knowledge of it.

Another point in his favour was a discovery made at the spot where the body was found. Some profane and ribald words, also in French, had been scrawled in chalk on the door and doorsill, being in the nature of a coarse defiance to the police to find the assassin, and experts in handwriting who were called testified unanimously that Burwell, who wrote a refined, scholarly hand, could never have formed those misshapen words.

Furthermore, at the time of his arrest no evidence was found on the clothes or person of Burwell, nothing in the nature of bruises or bloodstains that would tend to implicate him in the crime. The outcome of the matter was that he was honourably discharged by the coroner's jury, who were unanimous in declaring him innocent, and who brought in a verdict that the unfortunate woman had come to her death at the hand of some person or persons unknown.

On visiting my patient late on the afternoon of the second day I saw that his case was very grave, and I at once instructed the nurses and attendants to prepare for an operation. The man's life depended upon my being able to extract the bullet, and the chance of doing this was very small. Mr. Burwell realized that his condition was critical, and, beckoning me to him, told me that he wished to make a statement he felt might be his last. He spoke with agitation which was increased by an unforeseen happening. For just then a servant entered the room and whispered to me that there was a gentleman downstairs who insisted upon seeing me, and who urged business of great importance. This message the sick man overheard, and lifting himself with an effort, he said excitedly: "Tell me, is he a tall man with glasses?"

The servant hesitated.

"I knew it; you cannot deceive me; that man will haunt me to my grave. Send him away, doctor; I beg of you not to see him."

Humouring my patient, I sent word to the stranger that I could not see him, but, in an undertone, instructed the servant to say that the man might call at my office the next morning. Then, turning to Burwell, I begged him to compose himself and save his strength for the ordeal awaiting him.

"No, no," he said, "I need my strength now to tell you what you must know to find the truth. You are the only man who has understood that there has been some terrible influence at work in my life. You are the only man competent to study out what that influence is, and I have made provision in my will that you shall do so after I am gone. I know that you will heed my wishes?"

The intense sadness of his eyes made my heart sink; I could only grip his hand and remain silent.

"Thank you; I was sure I might count on your devotion. Now, tell me, doctor, you have examined me carefully, have you not?"

I nodded.

"In every way known to medical science?"

I nodded again.

"And have you found anything wrong with me,— I mean, besides this bullet, anything abnormal?"

"As I have told you, your eyesight is defective; I should like to examine your eyes more thoroughly when you are better."

"I shall never be better; besides it isn't my eyes; I mean myself, my soul,— you haven't found anything wrong there?"

"Certainly not; the whole city knows the beauty of your character and your life."

"Tut, tut; the city knows nothing. For ten years I have lived so much with the poor that people have almost forgotten my previous active life when I was busy with money-making and happy in my home. But there is a man out West, whose head is white and whose heart is heavy, who has not forgotten, and there is a woman in London, a silent, lonely woman, who has not forgotten. The man was my partner, poor Jack Evelyth; the woman was my wife. How can a man be so cursed, doctor, that his love and friendship bring only misery to those who share it? How can it be that one who has in his heart only good thoughts can be constantly under the shadow of evil? This charge of murder is only one of several cases in my life where, through no fault of mine, the shadow of guilt has been cast upon me.

"Years ago, when my wife and I were perfectly happy, a child was born to us, and a few months later, when it was only a tender, helpless little thing that its mother loved with all her heart, it was strangled in its cradle, and we never knew who strangled it, for the deed was done one night when there was absolutely no one in the house but my wife and myself. There was no doubt about the crime, for there on the tiny neck were the finger marks where some cruel hand had closed until life went.

"Then a few years later, when my partner and I were on the eve of fortune, our advance was set back by the robbery of our safe. Some one opened it in the night, someone who knew the combination, for it was the work of no burglar, and yet there were only two persons in the world who knew that combination, my partner and myself. I tried to be brave when these things happened, but as my life went on it seemed more and more as if some curse were on me.

"Eleven years ago I went abroad with my wife and daughter. Business took me to Paris, and I left the ladies in London, expecting to have them join me in a few days. But they never did join me, for the curse was on me still, and before I had been forty-eight hours in the French capital something happened that completed the wreck of my life. It doesn't seem possible, does it, that a simple white card with some words scrawled on it in purple ink could effect a man's undoing? And yet that was my fate. The card was given me by a beautiful woman with eyes like stars. She is dead long ago, and why she wished to harm me I never knew. You must find that out.

"You see I did not know the language of the country, and, wishing to have the words translated,— surely that was natural enough,— I showed the card to others. But no one would tell me what it meant. And, worse than that, wherever I showed it, and to whatever person, there evil came upon me quickly. I was driven from one hotel after another; an old acquaintance turned his back on me; I was arrested and thrown into prison; I was ordered to leave the country."

The sick man paused for a moment in his weakness, but with an effort forced himself to continue:—

"When I went back to London, sure of comfort in the love of my wife, she too, on seeing the card, drove me from her with cruel words. And when finally, in deepest despair, I returned to New York, dear old Jack, the friend of a life-time, broke with me when I showed him what was written. What the words were I do not know, and suppose no one will ever know, for the ink has faded these many years. You will find the card in my safe with other papers. But I want you, when I am gone, to find out the mystery of my life; and— and— about my fortune, that must be held until you have decided. There is no one who needs my money as much as the poor in this city, and I have bequeathed it to them unless—"

In an agony of mind, Mr. Burwell struggled to go on, I soothing and encouraging him.

"Unless you find what I am afraid to think, but— but— yes, I must say it,— that I have not been a good man, as the world thinks, but have— O doctor, if you find that I have unknowingly harmed any human being, I want that person, or these persons, to have my fortune. Promise that."

Seeing the wild light in Burwell's eyes, and the fever that was burning him, I gave the promise asked of me, and the sick man sank back calmer.

A little later, the nurse and attendants came for the operation. As they were about to administer the ether, Burwell pushed them from him, and insisted on having brought to his bedside an iron box from the safe.

"The card is here," he said, laying his trembling hand upon the box, "you will remember your promise!"

Those were his last words, for he did not survive the operation.

Early the next morning I received this message: "The stranger of yesterday begs to see you"; and presently a gentleman of fine presence and strength of face, a tall, dark-complexioned man wearing glasses, was shown into the room.

"Mr. Burwell is dead, is he not?" were his first words.

"Who told you?"

"No one told me, but I know it, and I thank God for it."

There was something in the stranger's intense earnestness that convinced me of his right to speak thus, and I listened attentively.

"That you may have confidence in the statement I am about to make, I will first tell you who I am"; and he handed me a card that caused me to lift my eyes in wonder, for it bore a very great name, that of one of Europe's most famous savants.

"You have done me much honour, sir," I said with respectful inclination.

"On the contrary you will oblige me by considering me in your debt, and by never revealing my connection with this wretched man. I am moved to speak partly from considerations of human justice, largely in the interest of medical science. It is right for me to tell you, doctor, that your patient was beyond question the Water Street assassin."

"Impossible!" I cried.

"You will not say so when I have finished my story, which takes me back to Paris, to the time, eleven years ago, when this man was making his first visit to the French capital."

"The mysterious card!" I exclaimed.

"Ah, he has told you of his experience, but not of what befell the night before, when he first met my sister."

"Your sister?"

"Yes, it was she who gave him the card, and, in trying to befriend him, made him suffer. She was in ill health at the time, so much so that we had left our native India for extended journeyings. Alas! we delayed too long, for my sister died in New York, only a few weeks later, and I honestly believe her taking off was hastened by anxiety inspired by this man."

"Strange," I murmured, "how the life of a simple New York merchant could become entangled with that of a great lady of the East."

"Yet so it was. You must know that my sister's condition was due mainly to an over fondness for certain occult investigations, from which I had vainly tried to dissuade her. She had once befriended some adepts, who, in return, had taught her things about the soul she had better have left unlearned. At various times while with her I had seen strange things happen, but I never realized what unearthly powers were in her until that night in Paris. We were returning from a drive in the Bois; it was about ten o'clock, and the city lay beautiful around us as Paris looks on a perfect summer's night. Suddenly my sister gave a cry of pain and put her hand to her heart. Then, changing from French to the language of our country, she explained to me quickly that something frightful was taking place there, where she pointed her finger across the river, that we must go to the place at once— the driver must lash his horses— every second was precious.

"So affected was I by her intense conviction, and such confidence had I in my sister's wisdom, that I did not oppose her, but told the man to drive as she directed. The carriage fairly flew across the bridge, down the Boulevard St. Germain, then to the left, threading its way through the narrow streets that lie along the Seine. This way and that, straight ahead here, a turn there, she directing our course, never hesitating, as if drawn by some unseen power, and always urging the driver on to greater speed. Finally, we came to a black-mouthed, evil-looking alley, so narrow and roughly paved that the carriage could scarcely advance.

"'Come on!' my sister cried, springing to the ground; 'we will go on foot, we are nearly there. Thank God, we may yet be in time.'

"No one was in sight as we hurried along the dark alley, and scarcely a light was visible, but presently a smothered scream broke the silence, and, touching my arm, my sister exclaimed:—

"'There, draw your weapon, quick, and take the man at any cost!'

"So swiftly did everything happen after that that I hardly know my actions, but a few minutes later I held pinioned in my arms a man whose blows and writhings had been all in vain; for you must know that much exercise in the jungle had made me strong of limb. As soon as I had made the fellow fast I looked down and found moaning on the ground a poor woman, who explained with tears and broken words that the man had been in the very act of strangling her. Searching him I found a long-bladed knife of curious shape, and keen as a razor, which had been brought for what horrible purpose you may perhaps divine.

"Imagine my surprise, on dragging the man back to the carriage, to find, instead of the ruffianly assassin I expected, a gentleman as far as could be judged from face and manner. Fine eyes, white hands, careful speech, all the signs of refinement and the dress of a man of means.

" 'How can this be?' I said to my sister in our own tongue as we drove away, I holding my prisoner on the opposite seat where he sat silent.

" 'It is a kulos-man,' she said, shivering, 'it is a fiend-soul. There are a few such in the whole world, perhaps two or three in all.'

" 'But he has a good face.'

" 'You have not seen his real face yet; I will show it to you, presently.'

"In the strangeness of these happenings and the still greater strangeness of my sister's words, I had all but lost the power of wonder. So we sat without further word until the carriage stopped at the little château we had taken near the Parc Monteau.

"I could never properly describe what happened that night; my knowledge of these things is too limited. I simply obeyed my sister in all that she directed, and kept my eyes on this man as no hawk ever watched its prey. She began by questioning him, speaking in a kindly tone which I could ill understand. He seemed embarrassed, dazed, and professed to have no knowledge of what had occurred, or how he had come where we found him. To all my inquiries as to the woman or the crime he shook his head blankly, and thus aroused my wrath.

" 'Be not angry with him, brother; he is not lying, it is the other soul.'

"She asked him about his name and country, and he replied without hesitation that he was Richard Burwell, a merchant from New York, just arrived in Paris, travelling for pleasure in Europe with his wife and daughter. This seemed reasonable, for the man spoke English, and, strangely enough, seemed to have no knowledge of French, although we both remember hearing him speak French to the woman.

" 'There is no doubt,' my sister said, 'It is indeed a kulos-man; It knows that I am here, that I am Its master. Look, look!' she cried sharply, at the same time putting her eyes so close to the man's face that their fierce light seemed to burn into him. What power she exercised I do not know, nor whether some words she spoke, unintelligible to me, had to do with what followed, but instantly there came over this man, this pleasant-looking, respectable American citizen, such a change as is not made by death worms gnawing in a grave. Now there was a fiend grovelling at her feet, a foul, sin-stained fiend.

" 'Now you see the demon-soul,' said my sister. 'Watch It writhe and struggle; it has served me well, brother, sayest thou not so, the lore I gained from our wise men?'

"The horror of what followed chilled my blood; nor would I trust my memory were it not that there remained and still remains plain proof of all that I affirm. This hideous creature, dwarfed, crouching, devoid of all resemblance to the man we had but now beheld, chattering to us in curious old-time French, poured out such horrid blasphemy as would have blanched the cheek of Satan, and made recital of such evil deeds as never mortal ear gave heed to. And as she willed my sister checked It or allowed It to go on. What it all meant was more than I could tell. To me it seemed as if these tales of wickedness had no connection with our modern life, or with the world around us, and so I judged presently from what my sister said.

"'Speak of the later time, since thou wast in this clay.'

"Then I perceived that the creature came to things of which I knew: It spoke of New York, of a wife, a child, a friend. It told of strangling the child, of robbing the friend; and was going on to tell God knows what other horrid deeds when my sister stopped It.

" 'Stand as thou didst in killing the little babe, stand, stand!' and once more she spoke some words unknown to me. Instantly the demon sprang forward, and, bending Its clawlike hands, clutched them around some little throat that was not there,—but I could see it in my mind. And the look on its face was a blackest glimpse of hell.

" 'And now stand as thou didst in robbing the friend, stand, stand'; and again came the unknown words, and again the fiend obeyed.

" 'These we will take for future use,' said my sister. And bidding me watch the creature carefully until she should return, she left the room, and, after none too short an absence, returned bearing a black box that was an apparatus for photography, and something more besides,— some newer, stranger kind of photography that she had learned. Then, on a strangely fashioned card, a transparent white card, composed of many layers of finest Oriental paper, she took the pictures of the creature in those two creeping poses. And when it all was done, the card seemed as white as before, and empty of all meaning until one held it up and examined it intently. Then the pictures showed.

And between the two there was a third picture, which somehow seemed to show, at the same time, two faces in one, two souls, my sister said, the kindly visaged man we first had seen, and then the fiend.

"Now my sister asked for pen and ink and I gave her my pocket pen which was filled with purple ink. Handing this to the kulos-man she bade him write under the first picture: 'Thus I killed my babe.' And under the second picture: 'Thus I robbed my friend.' And under the third, the one that was between the other two: 'This is the soul of Richard Burwell.' An odd thing about this writing was that it was in the same old French the creature had used in speech, and yet Burwell knew no French.

"My sister was about to finish with the creature when a new idea took her, and she said, looking at It as before:— 'Of all thy crimes which one is the worst? Speak, I command thee!'

"Then the fiend told how once It had killed every soul in a house of holy women and buried the bodies in a cellar under a heavy door.

" 'Where was the house?'

" 'At No. 19 Rue Picpus, next to the old graveyard.'

" 'And when was this?'

"Here the fiend seemed to break into fierce rebellion, writhing on the floor with hideous contortions, and pouring forth words that meant nothing to me, but seemed to reach my sister's understanding, for she interrupted from time to time, with quick, stern words that finally brought It to subjection.

" 'Enough,' she said, 'I know all,' and then she spoke some words again, her eyes fixed as before, and the reverse change came. Before us stood once more the honest-looking, fine-appearing gentleman, Richard Burwell, of New York.

" 'Excuse me, madame,' he said, awkwardly, but with deference; 'I must have dozed a little. I am not myself to-night.'

" 'No,' said my sister, 'you have not been yourself to-night.'

"A little later I accompanied the man to the Continental Hotel, where he was stopping, and, returning to my sister, I talked with her until late into the night. I was alarmed to see that she was wrought to a nervous tension that augured ill for her health. I urged her to sleep, but she would not.

" 'No,' she said, 'think of the awful responsibility that rests upon me.' And then she went on with her strange theories and explanations, of which I understood only that here was a power for evil more terrible than a pestilence, menacing all humanity.

" 'Once in many cycles it happens,' she said, 'that a kulos-soul pushes itself within the body of a new-born child, when the pure soul waiting to enter is delayed. Then the two live together through that life, and this hideous principle of evil has a chance upon the earth. It is my will, as I feel it my duty, to see this poor man again. The chances are that he will never know us, for the shock of this night to his normal soul is so great as to wipe out memory.'

"The next evening, about the same hour, my sister insisted that I should go with her to the Folies Bergère, a concert garden, none too well frequented, and when I remonstrated, she said: 'I must go,— It is there,' and the words sent a shiver through me.

"We drove to this place, and passing into the garden, presently discovered Richard Burwell seated at a little table, enjoying the scene of pleasure, which was plainly new to him. My sister hesitated a moment what to do, and then, leaving my arm, she advanced to the table and dropped before Burwell's eyes the card she had prepared. A moment later, with a look of pity on her beautiful face, she rejoined me and we went away. It was plain he did not know us."

To so much of the savant's strange recital I had listened with absorbed interest, though without a word, but now I burst in with questions.

"What was your sister's idea in giving Burwell the card?" I asked.

"It was in the hope that she might make the man understand his terrible condition, that is, teach the pure soul to know its loathsome companion."

"And did her effort succeed?"

"Alas! it did not; my sister's purpose was defeated by the man's inability to see the pictures that were plain to every other eye. It is impossible for the kulos-man to know his own degradation."

"And yet this man has for years been leading a most exemplary life?"

My visitor shook his head. "I grant you there has been improvement, due largely to experiments I have conducted upon him according to my sister's wishes. But the fiend soul was never driven out. It grieves me to tell you, doctor, that not only was this man the Water Street assassin, but he was the mysterious murderer, the long-sought-for mutilator of women, whose red crimes have baffled the police of Europe and America for the past ten years."

"You know this," said I, starting up, "and yet did not denounce him?"

"It would have been impossible to prove such a charge, and besides, I had made oath to my sister that I would use the man only for these soul-experiments. What are his crimes compared with the great secret of knowledge I am now able to give the world?"

"A secret of knowledge?"

"Yes," said the savant, with intense earnestness, "I may tell you now, doctor, what the whole world will know, ere long, that it is possible to compel every living person to reveal the innermost secrets of his or her life, so long as memory remains, for memory is only the power of producing in the brain material pictures that may be projected externally by the thought rays and made to impress themselves upon the photographic plate, precisely as ordinary pictures do."

"You mean," I exclaimed, "that you can photograph the two principles of good and evil that exist in us?"

"Exactly that. The great truth of a dual soul existence, that was dimly apprehended by one of your Western novelists, has been demonstrated by me in the laboratory with my camera. It is my purpose, at the proper time, to entrust this precious knowledge to a chosen few who will perpetuate it and use it worthily."

"Wonderful, wonderful!" I cried, "and now tell me, if you will, about the house on the Rue Picpus. Did you ever visit the place?"

"We did, and found that no buildings had stood there for fifty years, so we did not pursue the search."  *

____________

*  Years later, some workmen in Paris, making excavations in the Rue Picpus, came upon a heavy door buried under a mass of debris, under an old cemetery. On lifting the door they found a vault-like chamber in which were a number of female skeletons, and graven on the walls were blasphemous words written in French, which experts declared dated from fully two hundred years before. They also declared this handwriting identical with that found on the door at the Water Street murder in New York. Thus we may deduce a theory of fiend reincarnation; for it would seem clear, almost to the point of demonstration, that this murder of the seventeenth century was the work of the same evil soul that killed the poor woman on Water Street towards the end of the nineteenth century.

"And the writing on the card, have you any memory of it, for Burwell told me that the words have faded?"

"I have something better than that; I have a photograph of both card and writing, which my sister was careful to take. I had a notion that the ink in my pocket pen would fade, for it was a poor affair. This photograph I will bring you to-morrow."

"Bring it to Burwell's house," I said.

THE NEXT morning the stranger called as agreed upon.

"Here is the photograph of the card," he said.

"And here is the original card," I answered, breaking the seal of the envelope I had taken from Burwell's iron box. "I have waited for your arrival to look at it. Yes, the writing has indeed vanished; the card seems quite blank."

"Not when you hold it this way," said the stranger, and as he tipped the card I saw such a horrid revelation as I can never forget. In an instant I realized how the shock of seeing that card had been too great for the soul of wife or friend to bear. In these pictures was the secret of a cursed life. The resemblance to Burwell was unmistakable, the proof against him was overwhelming. In looking upon that piece of pasteboard the wife had seen a crime which the mother could never forgive, the partner had seen a crime which the friend could never forgive. Think of a loved face suddenly melting before your eyes into a grinning skull, then into a mass of putrefaction, then into the ugliest fiend of hell, leering at you, distorted with all the marks of vice and shame. That is what I saw, that is what they had seen!

"Let us lay these two cards in the coffin," said my companion impressively, "we have done what we could."

Eager to be rid of the hateful piece of pasteboard (for who could say that the curse was not still clinging about it?), I took the strange man's arm, and together we advanced into the adjoining room where the body lay. I had seen Burwell as he breathed his last, and knew that there had been a peaceful look on his face as he died. But now, as we laid the two white cards on the still, breast, the savant suddenly touched my arm, and pointing to the dead man's face, now frightfully distorted, whispered:—"See, even in death It followed him. Let us close the coffin quickly."

_________________

5: The Eighth Green Man

G. G. Pendarves

(Gladys Gordon Trenery 1885-1938)

Weird Tales, March 1928

Over a span of some ten years, the author wrote some 30 or 40 short stories and novelettes with strong occult and horror overtones, mostly published in Weird Tales, of which this is the most reprinted.

"DANGEROUS ROAD, huh!”

Nicholas Birkett slowed down and frowned at the battered old sign-post. “I’ll take a chance, anyhow!”

"I should try another road,” I said abruptly. ‘‘But this one leads right down to the valley, and will save at least ten miles round.”

“It’s a dangerous road— very dangerous,” I answered, with the conviction growing fast within me that the sign-post gave only a faint inkling of the deadly peril it guarded.

Birkett stared at me, his big brown hands resting on the steering-wheel.

“What d’ye know about the road, anyhow?” he asked, his round blue eyes blank with amazement. “You’ve never been this way in your life before!"

I hesitated. My name is famous in more than one continent as that of an explorer, and I had recently achieved an expedition across the Sahara Desert which had added immensely to my fame. In fact it was my lecture on this expedition, given in New York, that had brought about my friendship with Nicholas Birkett. He had introduced himself and carried me off to stay with him at his country estate in Connecticut, in a whirlwind of enthusiastic interest and admiration. How could I make my companion understand the shuddering fear that gripped me? I— Raoul Suliman d’Abre— to whom the face of Death was as familiar as my own. But it was not Death that confronted us on that road marked “Dangerous”... something far less kind and merciful! Not for nothing am I the son of a French soldier and an Arab woman! Not for nothing was I born in Algeria and grew up amidst the mysteries and magic of Africa. Not for nothing have I learnt in pain and terror that the walls of this visible world are frail and thin—too frail, too thin, alas! For there are times— there are places when the barrier is broken... when monstrous unspeakable Evil enters and dwells familiarly amongst us!

“Well!” My companion grew impatient, and began to move the car’s nose toward the road on our left.

“I’m sorry,” I answered. “The truth is... it’s a bit difficult to explain... but I have my reasons— very strong reasons— for not wishing to go down this particular road. I know— don’t ask me how— that it’s horribly dangerous. It. would be a madness— a sin to take that way!”

“But look here, old chap, you can’t mean that you... that... that you’re only imagining things about it?” His face was quite laughable in its astonishment.

I was frightfully embarrassed. How explain to such a rank materialist as Nicholas Birkett that instinct alone warned me against that road? How make a man so insensitive and practical believe in any danger he could not see or handle? He believed in neither God nor Devil! He had only a passionate belief in himself, his wealth, his business acumen, and above all, the physical perfection that went to make his life easy and pleasant.

“There are so many things you do not understand,” I said slowly. “I am too old a campaigner to be ashamed of acknowledging that there are some dangers I think it foolhardy to face. This road is one of them!”

“But what in thunder do you know of the damned road?” Birkett’s big fresh-colored face turned a brick-red in his angry impatience. Then he cooled down suddenly and put a heavy hand on my knee.

“You’re ill, old chap! Touch of malaria, I suppose! Excuse my being so darned hasty!”

I shook my head. “You won’t or can’t understand me! The truth is that I feel the strongest aversion from that path, and I beg you not to take it.”

Birkett looked me in the eye and began to argue. He settled down to it solidly. I had nothing to back my arguments except my intuition, and such a flimsy nothing as this he demolished with his big hearty laugh, and a heavy elephantine humor that reduced me to a helpless silence.

Opposition always narrowed Birkett down to one idea, that of proving himself right; and at last I said, “This is more dangerous for you than for me. I am prepared ... I know how to guard myself from attack, but you-”

“That settles it,” he interrupted, gripping the wheel and shooting forward with a jerk. “I can look after myself.”

His cheerful bellow echoed hollowly as the car dived into the leafy roadway under a branching archway of trees.

ii

BIRKETT became more and more boisterous in his mirth as we sped along, for the road continued smooth and virtually straight, descending in a gentle slope to the Naugatuck valley.

“Dangerous road!” he said, with a prolonged chuckle; “I’ll bet a china orange to a monkey that sign means a good long drink. Look out for an innocent little roadhouse tucked away down here. Dangerous road! I suppose that’s the latest way of advertising the stuff.”

It was useless to remonstrate, but I noticed many things I didn’t like along that broad leafy lane.

No living creature moved there— no bird sang—no stir of wings broke the silence of the listening trees— not even a fly moved across our path.

Behind us we had left a world of life, of movement and color. Here all was green and silent. The dark columns of the tree-trunks shut us in like the massive bars of a prison.

Shadows moved softly across the pale, dusty road ahead; shadows that clustered in strange groups about us; shadows not cast by cloud or sun or moving object, in our path, for these shadows had no relation to things natural or human.

I knew them! I knew them, and shuddered to recognize their hateful presence.

“You’re a queer fellow, d’Abre,” my companion rallied me. “You’d waltz out on a camel to meet a horde of yelling, bloodthirsty ruffians in the desert, and thoroughly enjoy the game. Yet here, in a civilized country, you see danger in a peaceful hillside! You certainly are a wonder!"

“Imshallah!” I murmured under my breath. “It is more wonderful that man can be so blind!”

“Are you muttering curses?” Birkett showed white teeth in a flashing grin at my discomfiture. "I suppose it’s the Arab half of you that, invents these ghosts and devils. Life in the desert must need a few imaginary excitements. But in this country it needs something more than imagination to produce a really lively sorl of devil. Something with a good kick to it.”

Suddenly, ahead of us, the trees began to thin out, and we caught a glimpse of a low white building to our left.

Birkett was triumphant. “What did I tell you?” he cried. “Here I am leading you straight to a perfectly good drink, and you sit there babbling of death and disaster!”

He stopped the car before a short flight of mossy steps; from the top of them we stood and looked at the house, glimmering palely in the dusky shade of many tall trees.

A flagged path led from where we stood to the house— a straight white path about fifty yards in length. On each side of it the tall, rank grass, dotted with trees and shrubs, stretched back to the verge of the encroaching forest. And within this spacious, parklike enclosure the distant house looked dwarfed and mean— a sort of fungus sprouting at the foot of the stately trees.

Birkett, undeterred by the menacing gloom of the whole place, cupped his hands about his mouth and gave a joyful shout, which echoed and died into heavy silence once more.

“Not expecting visitors,” he grinned. “This is a midnight joint, I’ll wager. Come on!”

At that moment we saw a sign at our elbow— a freshly painted sign— the lettering in a vivid luminous green on a black ground. It read:

“THE SEVEN GREEN MEN.”

iii

“SEVEN Green Men, hey! Don’t see ’em,” said Birkett, moving up the pathway. I followed, looking round intently, every nerve in me sending to my brain its warning thrill of naked, overwhelming terror crouching on every hand, ready to spring, ready to destroy us body and soul.

Then, suddenly I saw them!... and my heart gave a great leap in my body. They faced us as we approached the house, their grim silhouettes sharp and distinct against the white roadhouse behind. The Seven Green Men!

“Gee!” said Birkett. “Will you look at those trees? Seven Green Men! What d’you think about that?”

In two stiff rows before the house they stood, each one cut and trimmed to the height of a tall man. Their foliage was dense and unlike that of any tree or shrub I had seen in all my wanderings. A few feet away, their overlapping leaves gave all the illusion of metal, and seven tall warriors seemed to stand in rank before us, their armor green with age and disuse.

Each figure faced the west, presenting its left side to us; each bared head was that of a man shaved to the scalp; each profile was cut with marvelous cunning, and each was distinct and characteristic; the one thing in common was the eyelid, which in every profile appeared closed in sleep.

And when I say sleep, I mean just that.

They could awaken, those Seven Green Men!... they could awaken to life and action; their roots were not planted in the kindly earth, but thrust down deep into hell itself.

“The Seven Green Men! Well, what d’you think of that for an idea?”

And my companion planted his feet firmly apart, clasped his hands behind his broad back, and gazed in puzzled admiration at the trees.

“Some gardener here, d’Abre! I’d like to have a word with him. Wonder if he’d come and do a bit of work like that for me? A few of these green fellows would look fine in my own place. Beats me how the faces are cut so differently; must need trimming every day! Yes, I’ll say that’s some gardener!”

I put my hand on his arm. “Don’t you—can’t you see they’re not just trees? Come away while there’s time, Birkett.”

And I tried to draw him back from those cursed green men, who, even in sleep, seemed to be watching my resistance to them with sardonic interest. “This place is horrible... foul, I tell you! ”

“I came for a drink, and if these green fellows can’t produce it, I’ll pull their noses for them!” His laugh rang and echoed in that silent place. As it died, the door of the inn was opened quickly and a man stood on its threshold.

For a long moment the three of us stood looking at each other, and my blood turned to ice as I saw the great massive figure of the innkeeper. Most smooth and urbane he was, that smiling devil!... most punctilious and deferential in manner as he summed us both up, gaged our characters, our powers of resistance, our usefulness to him in the vast scheme of his infernal design.

He came down the flagged path toward us, passing through the stiff, silent rank of the seven green men— four on one side of the path, three on the other.

“Good morning, sirs, good morning! How can I serve you?”

His high, whispering voice was a shock; it seemed indecent issuing from that gigantic frame, and I saw from Birkett’s quick frown that it grated on him too.

“If you’ve got a drink wet enough to quench my thirst, I’d be almighty glad,” answered my friend, rather gruffly. “And about lunch... we might try what your green men can do for us!”

Our host gave a long snickering laugh, and glanced back at the seven trees as though inviting them to share the joke. He bowed repeatedly.

“No doubt of that, sir! No doubt of that! If you’ll come this way, we’ll give you some of the best— the very best.” His whisper broke on a high squeak. “Lunch will be served in ten minutes.”

I put a desperate hand on Birkett’s arm as he began to follow in the wake of the innkeeper.

“Not past them, not past them!” I urged in a low voice. “Look at them now!"

As we approached, the trees seemed to quiver and ripple as though some inner force stirred within their leafy forms, and from each lifted eyelid a sudden flickering glance gleamed and vanished.

Beneath my hand I felt Birkett’s involuntary start, but he shook me off impatiently.

“Go back, if you like, d’Abre! You’ll get me imagining as crazy things as you do, soon."

And he stalked on to the house.

iv

“ENTER, enter, sirs! My house is honored!”

Unaccountably, as we passed the threshold my horror gave place to a fierce determination to fight— to resist this monstrous swollen spider greedy to catch his human flies. Power against power— knowledge against knowledge— I would fight while strength and wisdom remained in me. I waved away the proffered drink.

“No, nothing to drink,” I said, watching his smooth pale face pucker at this first check in the game.

“Surely, sir, you will drink! You will not refuse to pledge the luck of my house! You are a great man— a great leader of men, that is written in your eyes! It is a privilege to serve so distinguished a guest.”

His obsequious whispers sickened me, and I gathered my resources inwardly to meet the assault he was making on my will.

When I refused not only to drink, but to taste a mouthful of the unique lunch provided, a sudden vicious anger flickered in his pale, cold eyes.

“I regret that my poor fare does not please you, sir," he said, his voice like the sound of dry leaves blown before a storm.

“It is better for me that I do not eat,” I answered curtly, my eyes meeting his as our wills clashed.

For a long, terrible minute the world dropped from under me: existence narrowed down to those malicious eyes which held mine. I held on with all the desperation of a drowning man tossing in a dark sea of icy waters— torn, buffeted, despairing, at the mercy of incalculable power.

With hideous, intolerable effort I met the attack, and by the mercy of Allah I won at last; for the creature tamed from me and smoothly covered his defeat by attending very solicitously to Birkett’s needs.

I relaxed, sick and trembling with the price of victory.

I had fought many strange battles in my life: for in the East, the Unknown is a force to be recognized, not laughed at and despised as in the West. Yet of all my encounters, this one was the deadliest, this evil, smiling Thing the strongest I had known in any land or place.

Must Birkett’s strength go to feed this insatiable foe who battened on the race of men?

I shuddered as I watched him sitting there, eating, drinking, laughing with his host; his whole mind bent on the pleasure of the moment, his will relaxed, his brain asleep; while the creature at his side served him with hateful, smiling ease, watching with cool, complacent eye as his victim let down his barriers one by one.

In his annoyanee with my behavior, Birkett prolonged the meal as long as possible, ignoring me as I sat smoking and watching our host as intently as he watched us. Anxiously I wondered what the next move in this horrible cat-and-mouse game would be; but it was not until Birkett rose from the table at last that the enemy showed his hand.

“It’s a pity you can’t be here on Friday night, sir! You’d be just the one to appreciate it. One of our gala nights— in fact the best night in the year at the Seven Green Men. You’d have a meal worth remembering that night. But I’m afraid they wouldn’t let you in on it.”

“Why not?” demanded Birkett, instantly aggressive.

“I beg your pardon, sir, but you see it’s a very special night indeed. There’s a very select society in this neighborhood; I don’t suppose you’ve so much as heard of it: The Sons of Enoch.”

“Never heard of ’em.” Birkett’s tone implied that had they been worth knowing, he would have heard of them. “Who are they? Those seven green chaps you keep in the grounds— eh?"

A cold light flashed in the inn-keeper’s eyes; and my own heart stood still, for the flippant remark had been nearer the truth than Birkett guessed.

“It’s a society that was founded ceuturies ago, sir. Started in Germany in a little place on the Rhine, run by some old monks. There are members in every country in the world now. This one in America is the last one to be formed, but it’s going strong, sir, very strong!"

“Then why the devil haven’t I been told of it before?”

“Why should you know of all the hole-and-corner clubs that exist?” I interposed.

The innkeeper was probing Birkett’s weakest part. How well— oh, how truly the smiling, smooth-spoken devil had summed up my poor blundering friend!

“It’ll be a society run for the Great Unwashed!” I continued. “You’d be a laughing-stock in the neighborhood if it got out that you were mixed up with scum of that sort!”

“There is much that your great travels have not taught you, sir,” answered the innkeeper, his sibilant speech savage as a snake’s hiss. “The members of this club are those who stand so high, that as I said, I fear they would not consent to admit you even once to their company.”

“Damn it all!” Birkett interrupted irritably. “I’d like to know any fellows out here who refuse to meet me. And who are you, curse you, to judge who can be members or not?”

Our host bowed, and I caught the mocking smile on his thin lips, as the fish rose so readily to his bait. I poured ridicule on the proposition and did all I could to turn Birkett aside, but to no avail. Opposition, as always, goaded him to incredible heights of obstinacy; and now, half drunk and wholly in the hands of that subtle devil who measured him so accurately, the poor fellow fairly galloped into the trap set for him. It ended with a promise on our host’s part to do all in his power to persuade the Sons of Enoch to receive Birkett and perhaps make him a member of their ancient society.

“Friday night then, sir! About 11 o’clock the meeting will start, and there’s a midnight supper to follow. Of course I’ll do my best for you, but I doubt if you’ll be allowed to join.”

“Don’t worry,” was Birkett’s valedictory remark. “I’ll become one of the Sons of Enoch on Friday, or I’ll hound your rotten society out of existence. You’ll see, my jolly old innkeeper, you’ll see!”

And as we left the grounds, passing once more the Seven Green Men, their leaves rustled with a dry crackle that was the counterpart of the inkeeper’s hateful, whispering voice.

v

OUR DRIVE homeward was at first distinctly unpleasant. Birkett chose to take my behavior as a personal insult, and, being at a quarrelsome stage of his intoxication, he kept up a muttered commentary: “...insulting a decent old bird like that... best lunch ever had . . . damned if I won’t... Sons of Enoch... what’s going to stop me... be a Son of Enoch... damned interfering fellow, d’Abre!...”

He insisted on driving himself, and took such a roundabout way that it was two hours later when we saw New Haven in the distance.

Birkett was sober, by this time and rather ashamed of his treatment of a guest. He insisted on pulling up at another little roadhouse, The Brown Owl, run by a New England farmer he wanted me to meet.

“You’ll like the old chap, d’Abre!" he assured me, eager to make amends for his lapse. “He’s a great old man, and can put up a decent meal. Come on, you must be starving.”

I was thankful to make the acquaintance of both old Paxton and his fried chicken... and Birkett’s restored geniality made me hopeful that after all he might not prove obdurate about repeating his visit to the Seven Green Men.

Old Paxton sat with us later on his porch, and gradually the talk veered round to our late excursion.

The old farmer’s face changed to a mask of horror. “The Seven Green Men! Seven, did you say? My God!... oh, mv God!”

My pulses leaped at the loathing and fear in his voice; and Birkett brought his tilted chair down on the floor with a crash. Staring hard at Paxton, he said aggressively, “That’s what I said! Seven! It’s a perfectly good number; lots of people think it’s lucky.”

But the farmer was blind and deaf to everything—his mind gripped by some paralyzing thought, “Seven of them now... seven! And no one believed what I told ’em! Poor soul, whoever it is! Seven now... Seven Green Men in that accursed garden!”

He was so overcome that he just sat there, saying the same things over and over again. Suddenly, however, he got to his feet and hobbled stiffly across the veranda, beckoning us to follow. He led us down the steps to his peach orchard behind the house, and pointed to a figure shambling about among the trees.

“See him ... see him!” Paxton’s voice was hoarse and shaken. “That’s my only son, all that’s left of him.”

The awkward figure drew nearer, approaching us at a loping run, and Birkett and I instinctively drew back. It was an imbecile, a slobbering, revolting wreck of humanity with squinting eyes and loose mouth, and a big, heavy frame on which the massive head rolled sickeningly. He fell at Paxton’s feet, and the old man’s shaking hand patted the rough head pressed against his knees.

“My only son, sirs!” We wrere horribly abashed and afraid to look at old Paxton’s working features. “He was the Sixth Green Man... and may the Lord have mercy on his soul!"

The poor afflicted creature shambled off, and we went back to the house in silence.

Awkwardly avoiding the farmer’s eye, Birkett paid the reckoning and started for his car, when Paxton laid a detaining hand on his arm.

“I see you don’t believe me, sir! No one will believe! If they had done so, that house would be burnt to the ground, and those trees... those trees— those green devils with it! It’s they steal the soul out of a man, and leave him like my son!”

“Yes,” I answered. “I understand what you mean."

Paxton peered with tear-dimmed eyes into my face.

“You understand! Then I tell you they’re still at their fiend’s game! My son was the Sixth... the Sixth of those Green Men! Now there are Seven! They’re still at it!”

vi

"HOW ABOUT staying on here and having another swim when the moon rises?” I said, apparently absorbed in making my old briar pipe draw properly, but in reality waiting with overwhelming anxiety for Birkett’s reply.

It was Friday evening, and no word had passed between us during the week of the Seven Green Men, or Birkett’s decision about tonight. He was sitting there on the rocks at my side, his big body stretched out in the sun in lazy enjoyment, his half-closed eyes fixed on the blue outline of Long Island on the opposite horizon.

"Well, how about it?” I repeated, after a long silence.

He rolled over and regarded me mockingly.

"Anxious nurse skilfully tries to divert her charge from his naughty little plan! No use, d’Abre; I’ve made up my mind about tonight, and nothing's going to stop me.”

I bit savagely on my pipe-stem, and frowned at an offending gull which wheeled to and fro over the lapping water at our feet.

As easily could a six-months-old baby digest and assimilate raw meat as could Birkett’s intellect grasp anything save the obvious; nevertheless I was impelled to make another attempt to break down the ramparts of his self-sufficient obstinacy.

But I failed, of course. The world of thought and imagination and intuition was unknown and therefore non-existent to him. The idea of any form of life, not classified and labeled, not belonging to the animal or vegetable kingdom, was simply a joke to him. And old Paxton’s outbursts he dismissed as lightly as the rest of my arguments.

"My dear chap, everyone knows the poor old fellow’s half mad himself with trouble. The boy was a wild harum-scarum creature always in mischief and difficulties. No doubt he did go to a midnight supper at the Seven Green Men. But what’s that got to do with it? You might as well say if you got sunstroke, for instance, that old Paxton’s fried chicken caused it!”

vii

"YOU don’t mean to say that you’re coming too?” asked Birkett, when, about 10:30 that night, I followed him out of doors to his waiting car.

"But of course!” I answered lightly. "You don’t put me down as a coward as well as a believer in fairy-tales, do you?”

"You’re a sport anyhow, d’Abre!” he said warmly. "And I’m very glad you’re coming to see for yourself what one of our midnight joints is like. It’ll be a new experience for you."

"And for you,” I said under my breath, as he started the engine and passed out from his dim-perfumed garden to the dusty white highroad beyond. A full moon sailed serenely among silvery banks of cloud above us; and in the quiet night river and valley, rocky hillside and dense forest had the sharp, strange outlines of a woodcut.

All too soon we reached the warning sign, "Dangerous Road,” and passed from a silver, sleeping earth to the stagnant gloom of that tunnel-like highway.

But hateful as it was, I could have wished that road would never end, rather than bring us, as inevitably it did, to that ominous green-and-black sign of our destination.

The sound of a deep rhythmic chant greeted us as we went up the steps, and we saw that the roadhouse was lit from end to end. Not with the mellow, welcoming radiance of lamp or candle, but with strange quivering fires of blue and green, which flickered to and fro in mad haste past every window of the inn.

“Some illumination!” remarked Birkett, “Looks like the real thing to me! Do you hear the Sons of Enoch practising their nursery rimes? Coming, boys!” he roared cheerfully. “I’ll join in the chorus!"

As for myself, I could only stare at the moonlit garden in horror, for my worst fears were realized, and I knew just how much I had dreaded this moment when I saw that the seven tall trees— those sinister deviltrees— were gone!

Then I turned, to see the huge bulk of the innkeeper close behind us, his head thrown back in silent laughter, his eyes smoldering fires above the ugly, cavernous mouth. Birkett turned too, at my exclamation, and drew his heavy eyebrows together in a frown.

“What the devil do you mean by creeping up to us like that?” he demanded angrily.

Still laughing, the innkeeper came forward and put his hand familiarly on my friend’s arm.

“By the Black Goat of Zarem,” he muttered, “you are come in a good hour. The Sons of Enoch wait to receive you— I myself have seen to it— and tonight you shall both learn the high mysteries of their ancient order!”

“Look here, my fine fellow,” said Birkett,“what the deuce do you mean by crowing so, loud? I’ve got to meet these nigger minstrels of yours before I decide to join them.”

From the house came a great rolling burst of song, a tremendous chant with an earth-shaking rhythm that was like the shock of battle. The ground rocked beneath us; gathering clouds shut out the face of the watchful moon; a sudden fury of wind shook the massed trees about the house and grounds until they moaned and hissed like lost souls, tossing their crests in impotent agony.

In the lull which followed, Birkett’s voice came to me, low and strangely subdued:

“You’re right, d’Abre! This place is unhealthful. Let’s quit.”

And he moved back toward the steps. But the creature at our side laughed again and raised his hand. Instantly the grounds were full of shifting lights, moving about us— hemming us in, revealing dim outlines of swollen, monstrous bodies, and bloated features which thrust forward sickeningly to gloat and peer at Birkett and me.

The former’s shuddering disgust brought them closer and closer upon us, and I whispered hastily, “Face them! Face them! Stamp on them if you can, they only advance as you retreat!”

Our host’s pale, smiling face darkened as he saw our resolution, and a wave of his hand reduced the garden to empty darkness once more.

“So!” he hissed. “I regret that my efforts to amuse you are not appreciated. If I had thought you a coward”— turning to Birkett—"I would not have suggested that you come tonight. The Sons of Enoch have no room for a coward in their midst!"

“Coward!” Birkett’s voice rose to a bellow at the insult, and in reaction from his horror.

"Why, you grinning white-faced ape! Say that again and I’ll smash you until you’re uglier than your filthy friends here. No more of your conjuring tricks! Get on to the house and show me these precious Sons of yours!”

I put my hand on his arm, but the blind anger to which the innkeeper had purposely roused him made him incapable of thought or reason, and he shook me off angrily.

Poor Birkett! Ignorant, undisciplined, and entirely at the mercy of his appetites and emotions— what chance had he in his fatuous immaturity against our enemy?

I followed him despairingly. His last chance of escape was gone if he entered that house of his own free will. ‘‘The trees are gone!” I said in a loud voice, pulling Birkett back, and pointing.

“Ask him where the trees are gone!”

But as I spoke, the outlines of the Seven Green Men rose quivering in the dimness of the garden. Unsubstantial, unreal, mere shadows cast by the magic of the Master who walked by our side, they stood there again in their stiff, silent ranks!

“What the deuce are you talking about?” growled Birkett. “Come on! I’ll see this thing through now, if I’m hanged for it.”

I caught the quick malice of the innkeeper’s glance, and shivered. Birkett was a lump of dough for this fiend’s molding, and my blood ran cold at the thought of the ordeal to come.

viii

OVER THE threshold of the house!... and with one step we passed the last barrier between ourselves and the unseen.

No familiar walls stood around us, no roof above us. We were in the vast outer darkness which knows neither time nor space.

I drew an Arab knife from its sheath— a blade sharpened on the sacred stone of the Kaaba, and more potent here than all the weapons in an arsenal.

Birkett took my wrists in his big grasp and pointed vehemently with his other hand. In any other place I could have smiled at his bewilderment; now, I could only wish with intense bitterness that his intellect equaled his obstinacy. Even now he discredited his higher instincts; even here he was trying to measure the vast spaces of eternity with his little foot-rule of earthbound dimensions.

Our host stood before us— smiling, urbane as ever; and, at his side, the Seven Green Men towered, bare-headed and armor-clad, confronting us in ominous silence, their eyes devouring hells of sick desire!

"My brothers!” At the whispered word, Birkett stiffened at my side and his grip on my arm tightened.

“My brothers, the Sons of Enoch, wait to receive you to their fellowship. You shall be initiated as they have been. You shall share their secrets, their sufferings, their toil. You have come here of your own free will... now you shall know no will but mine. Your existence shall be my existence! Your being my being! Your strength my strength! What is the Word?"

The Seven Green Men turned toward him.

“The Word is thy Will, Master of Life and Death!”

“Receive, then, the baptism of the initiate!” came the whispered command.

Birkett made a stiff step forward, but I restrained him with frantic hands.

“No! No!” I cried hoarsely. “Resist... resist him.”

He smiled vacantly at me, then turned his glazed eyes in the direction of the whispering voice again.

“No faith defends you... no knowledge guides you... no wisdom inspires you. Son of Enoch, receive your baptism!"

I drew my dagger and flung myself in front of Birkett as he brushed hastily past me and advanced toward the smiling Master. But the Seven Green Men ringed us in, stretching out stiff arms in a wide circle, machine-like, obedient to the hissing commands of their superior.

I leapt forward, and with a cutting slash of my knife got free and strode up to the devil who smiled, and smiled, and smiled!

“Power is mine!” I said, steadying my voice with hideous effort. “I know you ... I name you... Gaffarel!”

ix

IN the gray chill of dawn I stood once more before the house of the Seven Green Men.

The dark woods waited silent and watchful, and the house itself was shuttered, and barred, and silent too.

I looked around wildly as thought and memory returned. Birkett... Birkett, where was he?

Then I saw the trees! The devil-trees, stiff, grotesque and menacing in their armor, silhouetted against the white, blank face of the roadhouse behind.

The Seven Green Men!

Seven... no... there were eight men now! I counted them! My voice broke with a cry as I counted and recounted those frightful trees.

Eight!

As I stood there sobbing the words... eight... eight... eight! over and over, with terror mounting in my brain, the narrow door of the inn opened slowly, and a figure shambled out and down the path toward me.

A big, heavy figure that mouthed and gibbered at me as it came, pouring out a stream of meaningless words until it reached my feet, where it collapsed in the long dewy grass.

It was Birkett— Nicholas Birkett! I recognized the horrible travesty of my friend at last, and crept away from him into the forest, for I was very sick.

The sign was freshly painted as we passed it coming out, much later, for it was long before I could bring myself to touch Birkett, and take him out to the waiting car.

The sign was freshly painted as we passed... and the livid green words ran:

“THE EIGHT GREEN MEN.”

___________________

6: The Dragoman's Slave Girl

Otis Adelbert Kline

1891-1946

Oriental Stories Summer 1931

Otis Adelbert Kline wrote some half-dozen of these modern Arabian Nights tales, as told by white-haired Hamad the Dragoman, reminiscing of his youthful adventures when he was Hamad the Attar. One, "The Dragoman's Jest", was co-written with E Hoffman Price, who died in 1988, and it is therefore still copyright.

______

IT IS is written, effendi, that there are roses of many kinds. They grow in many lands, and many are the gardeners. But there is only one beauty of the rose— of the white rose or the red, the pink rose or the yellow. That beauty comes from Allah Almighty, and when once we have seen and smelt one beautiful and exquisite rose, then indeed have we sampled that perfect bliss which awaits all true believers in Paradise.

Like a flower from the very Gardens of the Blessed was Selma, Rose of Mosul. When the great Weaver of Destinies crossed the threads of her life and mine, we were plunged together into a strange and wondrous adventure which came near to severing both, yet for a time they were entwined, each with the other. Then, indeed, did I sample that bliss which is reserved for the faithful in the Gardens of Allah.

You would hear the story? Tale-telling, effendi, parches the throat. Yet if you would listen, here is the coffee shop of Silat, who brews the best ahhwi helwh to be found in the Holy City, and who learned his art from the great Hashim, father of coffee brewers in no less a place than Estambul.

Here we have both comfort and privacy. Ho, Silat! Two narghiles, scented with your best rose attar and packed with golden Suryani leaf. And brew for us coffee, bitter as love's first estrangement, black as the throne of Shaitan the Damned, and hot as the molten lava that boils in the innermost lake of Laza. Give ear, effendi, and I will unfold for you this wondrous adventure which befell me in the days of my youth.

Looking upon this bent and aged form and this white beard, you can scarce picture Hamed the Dragoman of those days. For then I was straight and strong as a young cedar of Lebanon, with hair of midnight blackness and features that were not accounted unhandsome. Nor feared I man nor jinni. I have related to you, effendi, my adventure with Mariam, Oracle of Ishtar, which left me with an empty heart and the opulence of a merchant prince. Hoping to find solace and forgetfulness in the curious scenes which other lands might afford, I decided to travel and see the world. I accordingly converted my wealth into gold and set out.

FOR more than a year I wandered, visiting the great cities of far Cathay and distant Hind, and spending with prodigal abandon. But there came a bleak dawn when I awoke in Singapore after a night spent in drinking the fiery liquors of the Ferringeh and watching the contortions of brown-skinned nautch girls. I found myself with a head that seemed as big as the Taj Mahal, and a purse that had shrunk alarmingly. I accordingly abandoned my intention to travel home overland, and took ship for Basra. From there I journeyed up the Tigris to Bagdad, and thence to Mosul.

Having crossed the stone bridge and the bridge of boats, I spent the morning wandering among the ruins of the buried city of Nineveh. Then I visited the grave of Jonah, on whom be peace, who was once rescued from the belly of a fish by Almighty Allah.

After I had viewed these wonders, I went to pray in the Great Mosque at the call of the ezam. Then, being hot and thirsty, I sought an airy coffee booth overlooking the souk.

My former great fortune, I found, had been reduced to a mere hundred dinars. It would be difficult to find employment as a dragoman, nor would it be lucrative, as few travelers of wealth were visiting the city at that time because of the oppressions and indignities heaped upon them by the new Governor, Mohammed Pasha, known as Keritli Oglu, the Cretan's son, whose cruel misdeeds had made him notorious throughout all Islam. Indeed it seemed to me that there were at least two dragomans for every traveler. I had once been an attar, however, and with a hundred dinars might open a small drug and perfume shop, and at least manage to exist. This I resolved to do.

As I sat there sipping my coffee, puffing at my shisha, and gazing abstractedly across the market square, I noticed that a great number of people were entering the stall of a rug merchant opposite me, but though more went in than the stall could possibly have held, none came out.

Puzzled, I paid my host, and crossing the square, was surprized to see the place evidently deserted. But a tall, night-black Nubian eunuch had gone in just as I came up, and in a moment I heard a voice say:

"You have the word?"

"Ayewah."

"Give it me."

"Zemzem."

"Enter."  There was the sound of a latch, footsteps, and a door opening and closing. Then the merchant stepped from behind one of the rugs hanging in the back of the booth.

"Salam alek'," he greeted.

"Was salam," I replied, stepping into the stall. He drew the rug aside, and I went on into a tiny back room.

"You have the word?" he asked me.

"Ayewah,"' I replied, remembering what I had heard. "Give it me."

"Zemzem." He pulled a tasseled cord, whereupon a curtain drew back disclosing a concealed door. Then a latch clicked, and the door swung open.

As soon as I stepped through that door I saw that I was in a slave mart. It seems that the British, the French and the Russians, all of whom had consulates in Mosul, frowned on the slave traffic. But so long as it was conducted behind locked doors through which none might enter without the secret word, it was impossible for them to take official cognizance of it.

I found myself in a walled enclosure, nearly filled with prospective buyers. They faced a great, flat-nosed, red-bearded fellow standing on an auction block. behind which was a door that opened in a small building at the far end of the lot.

FOR some time I stood there idly looking on, while he auctioned off girls and women, tall and short, young and old, fat and thin, willing and unwilling. There were slant-eyed, golden-skinned girls from Cathay, supple, brown-skinned nautch-girls from Hind, Nubian maids and matrons whose bodies were like polished ebony, and Abyssinians of the color of coffee. Then came the Circassians, Armenians, Persians, Nestorians and Yezidees, some quite good to look upon, and others distinctly ugly. But none interested me.

I turned to go, when suddenly I heard a chorus of "Oh's!" and "Ah's!" from the entire assembly.

Looking back toward the auction block, I was smitten with admiration for the witching vision of feminine loveliness that stood thereon. Then, scarcely knowing what impelled me to do so, I elbowed and jostled my way to a position just in front of the platform and stood there like the others, gaping up at the wondrous frail creature who, standing there beside her auctioneer, was as a gazelle beside an overgrown wart-hog.

Nor had Almighty Allah ever before vouchsafed me the privilege of beholding such grace and beauty. Her eyes were large and brown, and their sleepy lids and lashes were kohled with Babylonian witchery. Her mouth was like the red seal of Suleiman Baalshem, Lord of the Name, on whom be peace, and her smile revealed teeth that were matched pearls. The rondure of her firm young breasts, strutting from her white bosom beneath the glittering, beaded shields, was as that of twin pomegranates. And her slender waist swayed with the grace of a branchlet of basil, above her rounded hips.

The flat-nosed auctioneer stooped for a moment for a few words with a welldressed dignified graybeard who was evidently the owner of the little beauty. Then he straightened, and after clumsily describing the charms of her whose beauty defied description, stated that her master had stipulated that she should not be sold to any one against her will, but that if sold at all she would be accorded the right to choose who would be her new master from among those who would bid for her. Then he called for bids.

With but a hundred dinars in my purse, I knew it was useless for me to bid, for this girl would undoubtedly bring thousands. Yet so smitten was I with her loveliness that had I, at that moment, the vast wealth of Haroun al Rashid, I would gladly have bidden it all.

Over at my left a voice bid fifty dinars. I saw it was the huge black eunuch who had preceded me into the mart. It was a ridiculously low offer for the little beauty, whose rich clothing and jewels alone were worth twenty times the amount. But to my surprize not another voice was raised to increase it.

The girl glanced out over the sea of faces expectantly. Then her eyes found mine— clung for a moment— and in them was a look of appeal.

"Sixty dinars," I said.

A beetle-browed camel-driver who stood next me, nudged me with his elbow. "Bid no more if you value your life, O stranger," he said. "You are competing with the eunuch of Mohammed Pasha."

Glancing about, I saw that several others were staring at me as if astounded at my temerity.

"Seventy dinars," said the eunuch, scowling at me. Then I felt the point of a dagger against my ribs. 'Raise the bid, O dog of a Badawi," a voice grated in my ear, 'and you die."

Again those lustrous brown eyes looked at me with a world of appeal in their glance.

Suddenly I seized the wrist that held the dagger, swung it around in front of me, and twisted. The weapon clattered to the pavement, and I was glaring into the eyes of a villainous-looking Turk with a red tarbush and bag trousers. He grabbed for the dagger with his free hand, but I stepped on his fingers, so that he howled with pain.

Then I flung him from me, along the length of the platform. He fell at the feet of the Nubian eunuch as I bid: "Eighty dinars."

Half turning, I saw several more red tarbushes moving toward me through the packed crowd, and once I caught the glint of naked steel. I elbowed my way around the side of the platform so that I stood near the old man who seemed to be the girl's owner, with my back against the wall. Then I loosed my simitar in the scabbard.

The eunuch, who had evidently been waiting for the Turks to reach me, bid:

"Ninety dinars."

I whipped out my scimitar and the farbushes paused. A jambiyah hissed past my ear, snapping its point on the wall behind me before it clanked to the flag-stones. The Nubian frowned fiercely, rolling his eyes in my direction so that the whites gleamed against the black of his ebony skin. I turned to the old man who was the girl's master.

"I have but a hundred dinars," I whispered.

"Then bid, in the name of Allah, and save her from worse than death," he replied. "Remember, the girl will choose her master."

"One hundred dinars,'' I shouted, and the Turks moved closer, while blades gleamed menacingly, hemming me in.

"One hundred fifty dinars," roared the eunuch.

"I would bid more, but I have it not," I called up to the auctioneer. There was a look of triumph in the eyes of the Nubian. The ring of tarbushes around me began to move away. The auctioneer shouted to the crowd, enumerating the charms of the girl, which were plain to any but a blind man.

"Two hundred dinars," he cried.

"Who will pay two hundred dinars for this houri from Paradise? Why, her clothes, alone, are worth a thousand. One hundred seventy-five. Who bids one hundred seventy-five? Well then, sold to Mansur, chief eunuch of His Excellency, the Pasha, for—"

"One moment." The girl interrupted him with a voice as sweet and clear as the tinkle of a silver bell. "It was stipulated that I might choose my own master. I choose the young Badawi who has bidden his all— one hundred dinars."

"But you can not choose this pauper when His Excellency's servant has bid—"

"I choose the Badawi," persisted the girl.

"I will pay you baksheesh on the hundred and fifty," said the old man, sotto voce. "Make the sale quickly!"

"Sold to the young Badawi for one hundred dinars," shouted Flat-Nose hurriedly, mindful of his extra commission.

While the girl was stepping down from the platform I tossed my purse to the graybeard, who promptly handed fifteen dinars to the auctioneer. The tarbushes were closing in again, and there was no mistaking their purpose. The girl came up beside me. She had resumed her black street garments and donned her yashmak, over which her frightened eyes looked up at me.

"Master, we must get to the street quickly," she said, "for if the eunuch gives the word you will be cut down without mercy. I know a way through the house behind us. Follow me."

But she had scarcely finished speaking ere the Nubian shouted, and a half-dozen of the Pasha's cut-throats, who had only been awaiting the word, sprang at me with bared blades.

ii

AS THE first of the Pasha's ruffians assailed me, I whipped out my simitar and made as if I would lay his head open. But when he raised his blade to parry, I changed the direction of my stroke, and dealt him a leg-cut that laid him low. To my surprise, the graybeard to whom I had handed my purse drew his simitar and came on guard beside me as the others rushed up.

With the girl behind us, we slowly backed toward the doorway, the old fellow at my side cutting and parrying with a skill that amazed me. The crowd was in an uproar that all but drowned the noise of our clashing blades. Taunts and insults were hurled by the bolder of the onlookers at the Pasha's eunuch and his soldiery.

Then suddenly, a tall Badawin sheik leaped to the platform, and with a push sent the flat-nose plunging into the crowd that milled below.

"I bear witness," he roared in a voice that thundered above the tumult, "that this is foul injustice. How long, O men of Mosul, will we stand idly by to see true believers robbed and murdered by the Pasha and his wolves?"

For a moment all voices were stilled.

Then there were cries of: "Down with the Pasha!" "Down with the Cretan's son and his wolves!"

Blades were drawn and brandished, and the mob which had stood idly by for the sole reason that it lacked a leader, was now ready to fly at our attackers. Seeing the way things were going, Mansur the eunuch quickly called off his scoundrels, who picked up the man I had wounded and laying him at the feet of the castrado formed a semicircle in front of him.

But now the leader who had come so suddenly to our rescue, again demonstrated his ability to sway the mob, which, numbering well over a hundred, was ready to make short work of our persecutors. Flinging his hands aloft, he cried:

"Hold! Enough! We seek justice, nothing more."

Then, as the mob paused, he turned to the eunuch:

"I have a question to propound, O Mansur," he said. "Tell me, was this damsel lawfully purchased by the young Badawi, or was she not?"

"She was not, O Tafas," growled the eunuch. "He bid but a hundred dinars, while—"

The Arab interrupted him:

"It was stipulated that she might choose her master, and she has done so. All is fair and according to law. However, it seems that you are like a walnut— must be cracked in order to be of use. Ho, men of Islam." A menacing roar from the crowd drowned his voice for a moment.

Seeing the way things were going, and realizing the peril in which he stood, Mansur quickly changed his tone. "It may be that the sale was lawful," he admitted.

"You will bear witness?" asked Tafas.

"I bear witness that the sale was lawful," said the thoroughly cowed eunuch.

The Arab turned to where we stood— the old man, the girl, and I.

"Depart in peace," he said.

"May Allah requite you," I replied, and we turned and walked through the doorway, down a long, dimly lighted hallway, and into the street beyond. Here we all paused, I in considerable bewilderment.

"Lead on to your house quickly, Master," said the girl. "I will follow."

"But I have no house," I replied. "I am a stranger, sojourning in Mosul."

"You have a tent, then? A camel or a horse? Take me away swiftly, I beg of you."

"No tent, nor horse, nor camel have I. Nothing but my weapons and the clothes on my back."

"In that case," said the old man, "I invite you to my poor habitation. We must get off the street as soon as possible, for I am convinced we have not heard the last of this affair from the Pasha. Let us make haste."

WE SET off down the street, the girl following behind as is customary for slaves.

"By what name may I be permitted to call you," said the old man courteously, as we hurried along.

"I am Hamed bin Ayyub, late of Jerusalem," I replied, "where men once knew me as Hamed the Attar. Having lost my fortune through a scheming woman, I became a dragoman. Then, having won another fortune through a woman of quite a different sort, I became a traveler. You have witnessed the spending of the last of my latest fortune."

"My own fortune is in like case with yours," said the old fellow. "I am Hasan Aga, once the most opulent and powerful of the agas of Mosul. The girl you have just purchased is my niece, Selma Hanoum."'

"Then you, an aga, have sold your niece into slavery."

"Necessity compelled it," he said. "She is a great lady, and was wealthy in her own right until Mohammed Pasha came to Mosul. Her father, who married my sister, may Allah grant them both peace, was a pasha, and she his only child. He left to her the finest house in Mosul with its palatial furnishings, slaves, and the wealth to maintain it. But Mohammed the plunderer quickly found a way to dispossess her by unjust levies, and by lawsuits with perjured witnesses, brought before the dishonest kazi.

"Not satisfied with acquiring her property, her slaves and her wealth, the Pasha, having heard of her great beauty, attempted to force her into his harim, With her sole remaining slave, a faithful Magrhebi eunuch named Musa, she fled to my house for protection. Whereupon, the Pasha, who had already deprived four of our leading agas of everything they possessed, including their heads, began his persecutions of me. Today, I was left only in possession of my house, my head and my niece, and certain that itwould not be long before I should lose all three. At first I had concealed much of my wealth and that of my niece, but this I was forced to bring forth to save my head and to protect her. Four days ago I spent my last para for food. Destitute and starving, we could turn to no one for help, as nobody could offer us succor for fear of incurring the Pasha's wrath. And so terrorized were the merchants by the Pasha's wolves that they would not purchase the jewels and ornaments of Selma Hanoum, though I offered them at a small fraction of their worth.

"This morning, my niece, as a last resort, besought me to take her to the slave mart and sell her, making the stipulation that she should choose her own master. But the Pasha's spies must have followed us, and informed their master, who sent his eunuch and his ruffians to frustrate her plan for escaping his clutches. Knowing that many of the desert Badawin would be there, she planned to choose one as her master, hoping thus to get away from Mosul. Some weeks ago I sent a messenger to her cousin and my nephew, Ismail Pasha, in Estambul, requesting aid. As soon as help arrived, it was my intention to repurchase the daughter of my sister from the Badawi who would buy her."

"It is unfortunate that she chose a Badawi without wealth or followers," I said. "I have nothing but my blade and blood to give in her service."

"Women were ever wont to employ the heart rather than the head in such matters," he replied. "But here is my house. Bismillah. In the name of Allah, enter."

A Magrhebi castrado of about my own size and build admitted us.

"This is Musa, the slave of Selma Hanoum," said Hasan. "Musa, this is your mistress' master."

I exchanged taslims with the slave of my slave-girl, and we went into the magnificent majlis, now all but denuded of furnishings. The eunuch brought us water for washing our hands, and prepared pipes for us. Selma Hanoum had retired to the women's quarters, but returned presently, clad in filmy harim garments that covered, yet revealed, every curve of her perfect figure, and wearing a light face veil.

While we three discussed the perilous situation in which we found ourselves, Musa went to the souk for food and coffee. He returned presently, and Selma prepared a meal for us that would have broadened the breast of a sultan. We regaled ourselves with deliciously grilled mutton, dolmas, leban, and an excellent pilav, after which came fruits, nuts and sweetmeats.

Then, with pipes going, we made merry over our coffee and 'raki despite our dangerous predicament. But our merriment was cut short by a thunderous knocking at the door. Musa answered, and returned carrying a basket which he set on the floor before his mistress. "A gift for Selma Hanoum with the compliments of the Pasha," he said. "Open it," she directed.

He raised the lid, took out a napkin, then gasped in horrified amazement. One look into that basket, and Selma drew back with a choking cry.

Wondering what gift could have so fearful an effect, I peered into the basket.

The sightless, glassy eyes of an Arab stared up at me from a severed and gory head. I recognized the drawn features of Tafas, the Badawi who had championed our cause in the slave mart!

iii

NATURALLY the grisly gift of the Pasha threw us into a panic. But strangely enough, the girl was the coolest of us all.

"It is written on our foreheads," said Hasan to me, "that we are not long for this world. I doubt if we two will see the light of another day. Following this warning will come the soldiers. We will be dragged before the Pasha. There will be perjured witnesses to swear to such charges as may have been trumped up against us. Then— the swift stroke of the headsman, and the daughter of my sister will be at the tyrant's mercy."

"I, for one, do not intend to submit tamely," I replied. "When the soldiers come, I will fight."

"And I," agreed Hasan. "In our passing, we can thus take at least a few of the wolves with us."

"Valiant words, Master and Uncle," said Selma, "but how futile to rush into the jaws of death when, with a little planning, you may both live."

"A little planning? How?" asked Hasan, with the air of a drowning man clutching at a straw.

"There is the souterrain— the passageway which connects my house and yours."

"One can not exist for long in the souterrain without food and water,' said Hasan. "Besides, if Hamed and I were to enter it, what would there be to prevent your being carried off by the Pasha?"

"Nothing," she replied, "nor would there be, were you to foolishly, if bravely, die fighting his soldiers."

She turned to me.

"Master," she said, "the house in which the Pasha lives is rightly mine. In the days when my father was governor of this pashalik, he dug an underground passageway leading from a secret panel in his Harim to another secret panel in the harim of this house, which he also owned. He believed in being prepared for troublesome times, which are not uncommon hereabouts. More than one pasha has been murdered in his own house, so he planned this secret means of escape. In this house he established my uncle, who was apprised of the secret of the passageway.

"All this was done before I was born, yet before he died, my father told me of it, and showed me how to open the panel in his arim, and to travel through to this one. It has never been used, and to this day none knows of it but my uncle and I."

"And you would have me hide in a souterrain while you are carried off to the harim of the tyrant?" I asked. "No. I would rather—"

"But, Master, remember the souterrain connects with the Pasha's harim. Once inside, I can find a way to get food and drink to you and my uncle. Then we can plan our escape. I have already thought of a disguise for you. Come into the harim and I will apply it now, as we may not have the opportunity later."

She took my hand and led me into the harim. Then she bade me remove my upper garments and my slippers. While I was doing this she brought a bottle of brown liquid and a cloth.

"You and Musa are of one size and build," she said, "and were it not for his dark skin you might almost be twins. This is some walnut juice which I prepared some time ago, intending to use it myself in an attempt to escape. Now it would be useless to apply it, for any woman leaving this house would be seized. But if I disguise you as Musa, and arrange another disguise for my uncle, we may yet all find the means to escape."

I did not like the idea of even pretending to be a castrado, but despite my protests she began applying the walnut juice to my face with the cloth. After that it was useless to protest. When my face, neck and ears were thoroughly stained, she skilfully colored my trunk, arms and hands, spreading the stain so evenly that I looked to be in very truth the Moor I was to pretend to be.

While she was staining my feet and legs, I said: "In applying this color to me, O fairest Rose of Mosul, you only make me look like that which I really am."

"You mean," she said, with manifest consternation, "that you are really a eunuch?"

"Not that," I replied laughingly. "I mean that I am really your slave. From the moment I saw you on the auction block, I have been your love-slave."

A telltale and most becoming flush mounted to her temples above the yashmak, but she only said, with a last dab at my thigh:

"There. That is as far as I may go. Musa will finish, and will furnish you with a suit of his raiment."

She clapped her hands to summon the castrado. When he arrived she gave him his instructions and rejoined her uncle in the majlis. A short time thereafter, without a white spot left on my body, and attired in garments like those worn by Musa, I returned to the majlis with the eunuch.

"By my head and beard!' exclaimed Hasan. "This is a wondrous transformation. It seems that Musa has suddenly become twins."

But Selma was not satisfied. She called for the walnut juice and standing on tiptoes, applied deft touches here and there to my swarthy countenance. I thrilled with the nearness of her, and could scarce refrain from crushing her in my arms.

But she finished in a moment, and returned bottle and cloth to the eunuch, who took them away to conceal them with my clothing and weapons. The latter he had replaced with a huge, harim guard's simitar and a jewel-hilted jambiyah thrust in my sash.

WE THREE sat down to our coffee and pipes once more, and a few libations of 'raki soon set us to chattering merrily. Musa, meanwhile, carried food and water into the souterrain.

Our merriment was short-lived, for there came a second summons at the door, more loud and threatening than the first.

"They have come!" cried Selma. "Into the souterrain with you, quickly!"

She hastily donned her street attire.

"Go, Hasan! Take Musa with you," I said. "I'll answer the door."

"But Musa is to remain with me," said the girl. "I am Musa," I told her. 'I remain with you, and where you go, I will go."

"But you can not. They will detect and kill you."

"I remain," I persisted, giving the frightened Hasan a push toward the harim door.

ewildered, and muttering pious ejaculations in his beard, he fled. A moment later I heard him exchange a few words with Musa. Then the panel clicked, and they were gone. The pounding on the door was by now so fierce that it threatened to fly from its hinges. Selma watched me with terror-stricken eyes as I went to the door and called:

"Who ts it?"

"Daoud Aga, with soldiers. Open in the name of His Excellency, the Pasha," was the reply.

I slid the bar, flung the door wide, and stood with folded arms in the manner of a slave. Simitar in hand, a young and self-important aga brushed past me, followed by a dozen soldiers with muskets. Daoud Aga was the highest ranking military officer in the pashalik, the Yuz-bashi, or Captain of the Irregulars, and he took no small pride in the fact. Striding up to where Selma Hanoum sat, he demanded: "Where is the dog of a Badawi who had the temerity to cut down one of my men?"

"I know of no such Badawi, replied Selma, demurely.

"Where is your master—the man who bought you this morning?"

"Oh, my master! He has gone to the souk to buy tobacco."

"So! And where is your uncle, Hasan Aga?"

"Why, my uncle went with him."

"Lies! This place has been watched continually. None but your eunuch went forth and returned. Search the house, men."

"Search if you will, but you will find no one here save my eunuch and me." They searched the place thoroughly, but of course found no one.

"Once more," said Daoud Aga, "I give you the opportunity .o tell me the whereabouts of your master and your uncle. If you will not answer me, then must you answer the Pasha."

"I can tell you no more," replied Selma.

"Very well. Then come with me."' He turned to his men.

"Bismillah!" he cried, with a wave of his hands. "Eat, in the name of Allah!" The men responded with alacrity, and "ate" to their hearts' content, though with some quarreling among themselves, for this simply meant "to plunder."

From the Pasha down, the entire governmental organization was a band of legalized freebooters, and it was said that only by permitting his men to "eat" on such occasions as this did Daoud Aga hold them together.

The loot must have been quite disappointing to them. The Pasha, by means of levies and false claims, had long since annexed nearly everything of value, and Hasan had sold most of what remained, in order to buy food.

Selma rose, and obediently followed the aga, while I, whom she had followed as master only a short while before, now followed her down that same street as her slave.

Despite the perilous situation in which I found myself, I derived some small amusement from the idea of being the slave of my slave.

IT WAS only a short walk to the Pasha's house. Not more than six doors separated the two places. Yet, I reflected, considerable labor was required for the digging of a souterrain for even this distance. We were ushered into the salamlik, where the Pasha sat, cross-legged on a diwan, smoking and talking to a half-dozen of his satellites.

He proved as ugly in appearance as in reputation. His Excellency had but one eye. One ear had been torn off. He was short and of immense girth, and his features were deeply marked with smallpox pits. His gestures and mannerisms were as uncouth as his features, and his voice was harsh and strident.

With a wave of his hand, he dismissed his hangers-on as we entered. Squinting up at Daoud Aga with his single good eye, he rasped:

"Well, captain?"

"I have brought Selma Hanoum into thy presence, in accordance with Your Excellency's commands."

"So? And where are the others? The traitorous aga, her uncle, and the murderous young Badawi who wounded one of my men this morning?"

"I could not find them, Excellency, and she refused to reveal their whereabouts; so I informed her she must answer to you."

The Pasha leered up at the slight cloaked and veiled form standing beside the captain.

"Where are your uncle and your master?" he demanded.

"If I knew I would not tell you," she replied.

"What? You defy me, the Pasha?" He clapped his hands, and Mansur, the huge Nubian eunuch, came through a doorway at his left.

"Take this lady into the harim, Mansur," he said, "and prepare a room for her. She must be detained, and it will be more comfortable there than in the jail."

"Harkening and obedience, Excellency,"  responded the eunuch, and led her through the doorway.

The Pasha squinted up at me, then turned to the captain.

"Who is this fellow?" he asked.

"Musa the eunuch, slave of Selma Hanoum," replied Daoud Aga.

His Excellency smirked. "Well come and welcome," he said. "I have use for you."

"I kiss the dust at your feet, O dispenser of justice and fountain of wisdom," I replied, with as much slavish humility as I could muster.

Once more he clapped his hands, and Mansur reappeared: "Let this castrado be bowad of the rear door," he said, "and guard of the women's sleeping-quatrters."

"I hear and obey, Excellency," responded Mansur. Then he beckoned to me, and I followed him through the doorway.

iv

MANSUR led me through the majlis and up a stairway to a narrow balcony which fronted the women's quarters. Here a short, fat Nubian castrado whose shiny black torso was padded with rolls of flabby fat, stood guard.

"This is Sa'id, Bowab of the bab al harim," said Mansur, to me, and to the fat one, he said: "This one is Musa, slave of Selma Hanoum, who will guard the rear door and the sleeping-quarters."

I exchanged taslims with the greasy Sa'id, and was conducted into the harim. In the front was a roomy and magnificently furnished apartment. Here were more than a score of women and girls, some merely lolling, some smoking and chatting, some busy at needlework which no whit interfered with the clatter of their tongues, and the rest plying hair-tweezers and cosmetics in their efforts to improve on the handiwork of nature.

I was somewhat abashed at this sudden sight of so many unveiled and lightly clad females— no Moslemah deeming it necessary to hide her charms in the presence of a eunuch, who is not considered a man— and found it difficult to maintain an imperturbable countenance as Mansur led me through the room. Moreover, they were all staring at me and commenting on my appearance as if I were some new bit of furniture of doubtful value added to the Aarim by the Pasha.

The Lady Selma I saw, unveiled like the others, seated near a window with one slave-girl brushing her lustrous tresses and another staining her dainty toenails with henna, both working under the direction of a wrinkled hag. These attentions, I knew full well, meant that His Excellency was expected to call on the damsel that evening.

My blood boiled at the thought, and unconsciously my hand stole to the hilt of my simitar. Though there were many girls of considerable beauty in the room, Selma's loveliness outshone them all. She was a lone, budding rose in a weed-choked garden.

Mansur led me down a long hallway on which opened the doors of the women's sleeping-apartments, each wife and favorite concubine having a room to herself. At the end of the hallway a larger door led to a balcony which overhung that part of the garden reserved for the inmates of the harim. The balcony was screened with lattice work so that those standing thereon could see without being seen. An enclosed stairway led down into the walled garden.

A portly eunuch acted as bowab of the garden gate.

Mansur called him and introduced us. He was Sa'ud, twin brother of Sa'id, bowab of the bab al harim, and as like him as is one rice grain to another. Sa'ud went back to his post, and the chief eunuch gave me my instructions. I was to stand guard at the rear door of the harim, and to patrol the hall at regular intervals. At night I would sleep on a diwan beside the rear door, keeping my simitar always by me.

I remained at the door until some time after Mansur had left. Then I sauntered down the corridor and looked for a moment into the women's majlis. The two slaves were still busy with Selma Hanoum, under the directions of the old trot, trying to improve on the beauty of a rose which Allah Almighty had made perfect.

As I turned and sauntered back along the hallway, I knew that I was drowned in a sea without bottom or shore— head over heels in love. Returning to my post, I seated myself on the diwan beside the door, and was lost in a maze of lover's dreams when there came to my ears the soft tones of a lute, then the sweet voice of a female singer.

As I mooned there by the door, the words of her love song suited my mood:

"Thou hast made me ill,

O my beloved!

And my desire is for nothing but thy medicine.

Perhaps, O fairest flower, thou wilt have mercy upon me,

For verily my heart loveth thee.

O thou blushing rose! O thou perfect rose!

Heal my bleeding heart with the perfume of thy presence."

Although it was not time for me to patrol the corridor again, I rose, and walked to the door of the majlis to see who was the singer. Seated on a cushion near the door holding the lute, was a Magrhebi dancing-girl with slender waist, full, round breasts and exquisitely formed limbs. She was darker than Selma Hanoum, with hair that was black and lustrous, and eyes whose smoldering glances could kindle the flame of desire like a firebrand tossed among dry reeds. She turned those orbs on me while the other inmates of the harim cried their approval.

"Well done, O Fitnah! Allah approve you! Allah preserve your voice!"

"And do you like my song, O chamberlain?" she asked me, when the clamor of the others had subsided.

For a moment I was too astonished for speech at being thus addressed. But I recovered my voice, and said: "Does a starving man dislike food, or a thirst-parched desert traveler turn away at the sight of water? If these things be true then I can not abide your music. But if they be not true, then do I hunger and thirst after it."

The girl laughed, a low musical laugh. Looking at Selma, she said: "Your slave has a gifted tongue. From what country came he, and what is his name?"

"He is from El Mogrheb," replied Selma, "and his name is Musa."

"Ah, from my own country!" said the girl. "I surmised as much. From what city, Musa?"

I thought fast, and remembering the name of a Moroccan city, replied: "From Marrakesh."

"Why, this is amazing!'' said Fitnah. "It was in that city I was born and reared. You remember the street of so and so that passed by the mosque of such and such?"

"Assuredly," I replied, though I had never heard, nor can I even now remember the names she mentioned, "as I went dow that street every Friday to worship at that very mosque."

"Marvel of marvels!" she exclaimed. "And to think that was the very street on which I lived! It may even be that we are cousins. You must tell me of your family and tribe some time. But now I will sing for you in memory of Marrakesh, that pearl among cities, which was your home and mine."

She sang again, stroking the lute softly and flashing at me from time to time such seductive glances that despite my love for Selma I was stirred by her witchery. Nor did her eyes look solely into mine, but swept over me appraisingly from head to foot, making me uncomfortably conscious of my bare limbs, naked torso and scant loin-cloth. When she finished I applauded and returned to my diwan.

This dancer, it seemed to me, had been well named. For "Fitnah" has several meanings, among which are: "beautiful girl," "seduction," and "aphrodisiac perfume.'' She was certainly a combination of all three— a lodestone to draw men's desires, well knowing how to shape them to suit her own ends. Such women are dangerous.

A NARGHILE stood beside my diwan, with tobacco and charcoal. I lighted it, and was puffing reflectively, meditating on the singular circumstances in which I found myself, when I heard the tinkle of anklets in the corridor.

Looking up, | saw Fitnah, carrying her lute. She did not so much as glance in my direction, but raised a curtain and entered a near-by doorway. A moment later, however, she peered out at me, and softly called:

"Musa."

"What is it?" I asked.

"I have need of your strength. My diwan is heavy, and I would have it nearer the window. Will you help me move it?"'

"Assuredly," I responded, and went into her apartment. To my surprise, I saw that her diwan was directly beneath the window.

She noticed my puzzled look, and smiled. "Certainly," she said, "you are not as dense as you pretend to be." Then she came up to me, swaying her shapely hips in the wanton manner of the gazeeyeh dancing-girls of the bazars, and before I knew what she was about, had flung her arms about my neck, pressing her shapely body close to mine.

I tried to draw away, but she clung the tighter, charming me with her smoldering eyes— fanning the flames of my desire. She was intoxicating! Overpowering! Maddening! Slowly our lips met, and clung. Rivers of fire coursed through my veins as I tried to shake off the spell of her accursed witchery. Again I tried to push her away, repeating the formula:

"I seek refuge with Allah from Shaitan, the Stoned!"

But she only smiled up at me, stroking my face and murmuring:

"Musa, I love you."

Suddenly the door-curtain was drawn back and a slender figure stepped into the room. It was Selma. Surprised, she looked at us for a moment, then said: "I am sorry to intrude, Fitnah. I thought you were alone."

I was too astonished and mortified to speak. And Fitnah did not. In a moment, Selma was gone. Resolutely, now, I tore the temptress' arms from around my neck— pushed her away. She flung back her head, hands on hips, eyes blazing. It seemed that she could be, at will, a cooing dove or a tigress.

"So," she said, ''you do not relish the caresses of your little Moroccan cousin when Selma Hanoum is near. It may be, after all, that I shall report you to the Pasha. What are you doing in this harim masquerading as a Magrhebi eunuch? I knew you were no Magrhebi as soon as you spoke, by your accent. Then to test you further, I mentioned a certain street and mosque. You said that you walked that street and prayed at that mosque in Marrakesh. But unfortunately for the plausibility of your statement, both are in Cairo. I also suspected that you were no castrado. Now— I know."

"If it is gold you want as the price of silence, I have it not,'' I said.

She laughed harshly.

"Gold! I have enough for us both— for a dozen more like us, were all to live a hundred years. Until today I was the Pasha's favorite. He showered me with gold, jewels and presents. But today, Selma Hanoum robs me of my place. Today I must sit back with the others over whom I have lorded it, to be neglected— humiliated."

She snatched a dagger from her bosom— brandished it in my face.

"You see this? I had intended to sheathe it in the heart of Selma Hanoum, who was brought here to usurp my place. Then I saw you. It seemed a fair exchange. In taking the Pasha from me, she brought me you. My eyes are sharp, and I was not deceived like the others. Moreover, I was pleased with what I saw. But now— it seems that you would scorn me."

To my surprise, she dropped the dagger, burst into tears, and flung herself face down on the diwan. My first impulse was to flee, but before I had taken three steps I thought better of it. Here, indeed, was a dangerous, headstrong girl. Capable of committing murder because her plans were thwarted, she certainly would not be above carrying out her threat and reporting me to the Pasha. She must be calmed somehow— pacified.

I knelt beside the diwan, laid my arm across her shaking shoulders.

"Dry your tears, my pretty one," I said. "It was not scorn that made me act as I did, for I have a profound admiration for your exquisite charms."

"Then— what— was it?'' she asked, between sobs.

"Piety," I replied, "and humility. It is both unlawful and unseemly that I, a mere—"

"Oh Father of Lies!" she interrupted. "Do you think thus to deceive me? I will give you one chance, and one only. Tonight when the Pasha goes in to Selma Hanoum, come to me. If you do not, tomorrow will be the day of your death. You have until midnight to make your choice— the arms of Fitnah or the sword of the headsman."

"Why, that's a choice easy to make," I replied. ''It will be a pleasure for me to see that, while the Pasha is engaged this evening, you do not lack a lover."

v

I REELED out of Fitnah's apartment, my brain awhirl. A plan had occurred to me on the spur of the moment, which had led me to make the rash promise that she would not lack an amorado that night. Yet this scheme, I now reflected, required the co-operation of Selma Hanoum if it were to have even a slight chance of success. And judging from the look of scorn with which she had favored me when she saw Fitnah in my arms, she was not in a mood to be of assistance to me.

Returning to my diwan beside the door, I flung myself down to think—to plan. What could I say to Selma? If I were to try to explain the compromising situation in which she had found me, would she listen?

So wrapped was I in the dark mantle of my gloomy meditations that I did not, at first, see that the object of my thoughts stood in her doorway and was endeavoring to attract my attention. But the persistent clinking of a bracelet against the door jamb caused me to raise my eyes.

To my astonishment, I saw that Selma was beckoning to me. When she saw that I understood her signal, she stepped back, letting the curtain fall in front of her.

Rising, I hurried to her doorway, drew back the curtain, and entered. Selma was reclining on her diwan in a pose that revealed every seductive curve of her perfectly modeled body.

As my eyes drank in the glory of her loveliness, I mentally compared her with Fitnah, who, though she would have been accounted a great beauty even in the seraglio of the Sultan, was coarse and uninteresting when compared to my little slave girl. So filled was my heart with the love of Selma that the very thought of Fitnah tn my arms brought revulsion. It seemed to me that I must have been jinn-mad to have even been tempted by the charms of the Magrhebi after having once seen the Rose of Mosul. The voice of Selma recalled me from my ecstasy of adoration.

"There are some things that must be done quickly," she said, "and I can not accomplish them without your aid."

"Your slave but awaits instructions, hanoum," I replied.

She seemed to have completely forgotten the Fitnah episode, and the explanations which I had planned to make were thereby postponed.

"The panel," she said, "is in the room directly across from this one, occupied by Jabala, the Kashmiri. I must have that room."

"Are you suggesting that I strangle this Kashmiri?" I asked.

"Hardly that," she replied. "You seem to have persuasive ways with women. Suppose you induce her to take another room. There are several others vacant."

"I will try, hanoum," I replied, and bowing, withdrew.

Throughout the short interview she had shown no emotion whatever. I could not tell whether she had been angered at sight of the girl in my arms, or was merely indifferent. Neither boded good for me.

CROSSING the corridor, I raised the curtain.

Reclining on a diwan was a brown-skinned girl of voluptuous form and not unpleasing features. She was loaded down with jewelry and bangles of all descriptions. Finger rings, toe rings, anklets, bracelets, armlets and necklaces were hung on her person in such numbers that the aggregate would have been enough to start a small jeweler's shop. And not only were her body and limbs bedecked, but her face and head as well. Heavy rings hung from her ears, stretching the lobes. There was a diamond pasted to the middle of her forehead. And a large ruby flashed from one pierced nostril. Her headdress was decked with coins and metal ornaments.

"Is this the apartment of Jabala, the Kashmiri?" I asked.

"Jabala would not otherwise be using it, O chamberlain," she drawled, in a rich contralto voice with a husky undertone. "I have been instructed, ya sitt," I said, "to assist you to move to another apartment."

"But I do not care to move," she replied. "I like this apartment."

"Is it your desire that I so inform the Pasha?'' I asked.

"No, I will move. Here, carry this chest."

She pointed to an immense chest, which I upended and took on my back. My ruse had worked, thus far. It would be unfortunate if I should happen to stumble upon Mansur or the Pasha in the corridor.

I looked out. As there was no one in sight, I stepped forth into the hallway, and made for a room near the rear door, which I knew was vacant.

It was poorly furnished, and much smaller than the one occupied by Jabala, who was evidently well liked by the Pasha. I wondered what the consequences would be when she complained, which she would undoubtedly do next time he visited her. Well, that would be a bridge to cross when the time should come.

As I lowered the chest, Jabala came in behind me, her ornaments tinkling and clattering wich every step.

"It is a small room," she said, "and I dislike it, except for one thing."

"What is that?" I inquired, more out of politeness than curiosity.

"It is conveniently near your diwan," she replied, looking at me in a manner that reminded me of the appraising glances of Fitnah.

Horns of Eblis! Had she, too guessed? Or had Fitnah told her?

I backed hastily out of the room, ignoring the coquettish glance she cast at me from beneath long black lashes, and hurried to the apartment of Selma. She was gone. I stepped across the hall and found her already installed in the room just vacated by the Kashmiri. She closed the door and bolted it.

"I'll show you the secret of the panel," she said. "You may have sudden need for it at any time."

Stepping up on the low diwan, she drew back a corner of the handsome Kashgar rug which hung in the nook behind it. Back of it was a panel that looked no different from the others in the room, surrounded by a molding on which were carved rosettes, spaced about three inches apart.

"Observe," she whispered, "that it is the fifth rosette from the bottom."

She pressed the center of the rosette. There was a click, and the panel slid to the left, revealing a dark opening into which the top of a ladder, nailed to the outer wall, projected from below. Leaning over, she softly called:

"Uncle."

"Coming," was the reply from below, and I heard some one ascending the ladder. In a moment the bearded face of Hasan Aga appeared in the opening.

"What is it?" he asked. "Musa waits below."

"Nothing, except to give you this food," she said, handing him a bundle which she carried, "and to ask you and Musa to remain near the ladder tonight. I may have sudden need of you both."

"We will stay within call," replied Hasan. "Do you plan to run away tonight?"

"My plans are uncertain, as yet," she answered. "The Pasha's wolves have stripped my house," he told her, "and sealed the door with his seal. It may be, however, that we can escape over the garden wall without attracting attention. I go now, but we will be near the foot of the ladder, Musa and I. Allah guide and keep you."

"And you, ya amm," she replied. He descended, and she again pressed the center of the fifth rosette, whereupon the panel slid back into place. I resolved to broach my plan.

"Fitnah has discovered that I am no eunuch," I said.

"I surmised as much," replied Selma, dropping to the diwan.

"She knew I was no Moor by my accent," I went on.

"Yes?"

"And she trapped me into recognizing a street and mosque in Marrakesh, which are really in Cairo. She guessed the rest."

Selma looked at me searchingly.

"Did you say: 'Guessed'?"

I felt myself blushing furiously, and for the first time was thankful for my walnut juice complexion.

"Selma, believe me,'' I pleaded. "I did not mean to make love to her— did not want her in my arms. I swear to you by the Most High Name—"

"Stop!" she commanded imperiously. She regarded me with a look of regal hauteur, eyes flashing furiously. Though fortune had made her my slave-girl she was still the daughter of a pasha.

"How dare you mention the Most High Name in the same breath with that brazen adulteress? Go! Leave me! Do you think I am interested in your vulgar amours?"'

"Only insofar as they concern our mutual desire to frustrate the Pasha," I replied, nettled. "I had a plan which involves this Fitnah. If you do not care to hear it, I will go. I came into this affair, risking my life, for one reason alone. I love you, and desire to serve you. From you, I have asked, and now ask— nothing."

"That is true," she admitted, softening. "Allah forgive me, I spoke without right or reason."

She rose, and gently laid a hand on my arm.

"I'm sorry," she murmured, contritely. ''Please tell me of your plan."

"Tonight the Pasha comes to you," I said. "This Fitnah has threatened to betray me, unless—"

"Hush," she admonished. "Speak in a whisper. Some one may hear you."

And so I whispered in her shell-pink ear the plan that had occurred to me when I had, under compulsion, made a certain promise to the Magrhebi dancing-girl.

vi

LATE that night I lay, turning and tossing on my déwan beside the rear door. Needless to say, I had not slept. Twice, earlier in the evening, the Kashmiri had appeared in her doorway, signing to me with her eyes. But I had pretended not to see. Once, as I patrolled the corridor, Sa'id, the fat Bowab of the bab al harim, had called to me across the majlis, volunteering the information that the Pasha was drinking in the salamlik with boon companions. Faintly there had come to me the sound of dance music, followed by drunken shouts and ribald laughter.

The inmates of the harim had all retired. Many of them snored, but loudest of all snored the plump Kashmiri, whose room was near my diwan. Under other circumstances I should have cursed her for it, but that night I was thankful to be thus loudly apprised of the fact that she slept.

It had been a long, nerve-racking vigil. In the early morning stillness every sound was intensified. From some near-by roost a cock crowed. Others answered him, each in a different pitch. A young cockerel essayed to imitate them, but his voice broke in the middle with a choking sound, and he ended with a feeble squawk.

Suddenly I heard footsteps at the dab al harim, and some one gabbling loudly— drunkenly. Leaping up, I hurried to the women's majlis. Across the room came the Pasha, leaning heavily on the brawny arm of Mansur. I made profound obeisance as he came up. He was very drunk and very maudlin.

"Peace upon you, lord of the bedchamber," he said to me. "Where's my little rosebud?"

"I kiss ground between your hands, O protector of the poor," I said. "The lady eagerly awaits Your Excellency's coming, and pines because you have remained away from her for so long."

"I was busy," he said with drunken gravity. "Very important conference. Take me to her."

He turned to the big Nubian. "Go to bed, Mansur."

The huge eunuch bowed solemnly, but grinned derisively behind his back as Mohammed lurched over to support himself by clinging to my arm. As Mansur moved away, the Pasha looked up at me, squinting his single, bloodshot eye.

"Wallah!" he said, swaying from side to side. "I've drunk enough 'rak this night to float the Russian fleet. Did you say the lady was pining for my company?"

"She is devastated by Your Excellency's neglect of her," I replied. He fumbled at his waistband— found and produced a piece of gold which he handed me.

"Allah increase your prosperity," I said, pouching the gold.

"Lead on," he ordered. "Don't want my little rosebud to suffer any longer than necessary."

"The lady has asked, as a special favor, that her room be kept in darkness this night," I said, as we strolled down the corridor. "You know she has—"

"Say no more," he interrupted. "Her wish shall be granted. Light or dark, it's all the same to me."

We stopped before the door of the apartment, and I drew back the curtain. The Pasha stumbled in. I closed the door behind him and dropped the curtain. Then I turned and crossed the corridor, entering the opposite room in which a single candle sputtered, and softly closing the door behind me.

The girl on the diwan sat up. "I must have fallen asleep. Has he come?"

"Yes, hanoum," I replied. "He is very drunk, and has gone in to Fitnah. Thus far my plan has worked. The girl has discovered the trick by now, of course, but she will not dare to say anything. As for the Pasha, he is so overcome with 'raki that I doubt if he could tell a woman from a camel, let alone one woman from another. Besides, the room is in darkness. I suggested this to Fitnah for safety's sake, then told the Pasha it was your wish that it be kept dark."

"Which was quite true," she said. "We must tell my uncle and Musa of this."

Turning, she raised the rug and pressed the button. The panel slid back, and a low call brought Hasan Aga and Musa she said. scrambling up the ladder. Then we four went into council. The aga and eunuch were convulsed with laughter when I told them how we had thus far outwitted the tyrant and his scheming concubine.

But after, Hasan grew grave.

"We are safe enough for the present," he said, "but when the Pasha wakens it will be a different story. Both of you will be in deadly peril."

"Perhaps it would be best if we would all go into the souterrain now," said Selma. "It might be that we could hold out there until the arrival of Ismail Pasha."

"Your cousin may arrive tomorrow," said Hasan. "On the other hand, he may be delayed for weeks or months. Or he may never come. It is possible that he has not been granted a firman. In this case, we should starve in the souterrain without help from outside. For who, in this city, would dare to help us? The fate of Tafas and others before him is a sufficient warning to prevent others trying to befriend us.

"On the other hand, we might try to escape under cover of darkness. But where could we go? And how? Without horses or camels or the means to hire or purchase any, we could not get far. We would only be apprehended and exeauted, and Selma would be returned to the Pasha's harim without hope of succor."

"Why not slit the throats of this Cretan's son and his wench, and hide their bodies in the souterrain?" asked Musa.

"There is nothing I would like better," said Hasan, "and there are thousands of true believers in this pashalik who would applaud the act. But it could only bring death to all of us in the end. The arm of the Sultan is long, and the majesty of his government must be maintained."'

"It seems to me," I said, "that the hanoum and I should be able to carry on here for at least another day. The Pasha mentioned no names last night, and it was only natural for me to lead him to the door of his favorite. As for this Magrhebi, she will not dare to expose me to the Pasha for fear I might reveal her defection."

"One never knows what a woman will do," said Hasan. "However, if it is the wish of Selma that this be done, I see no serious objection. There is, after all, little choice between one course and another. Musa and I will be here within call if trouble arises, and as a last resort we can bolt the door of this room, pry out the window bars to make it appear that we escaped that way, and then enter the souterrain."

And so it was agreed. Hasan and Musa returned to the souterrain, and I to my diwan beside the door.

I arrived just in time to make ablution and pray the dawn prayer. Presently a slave-girl brought me my breakfast. Soon the harim inmates began coming out of their rooms. Some went into the malizs, Selma among these. Others strolled out into the garden.

Presently Fitnah came out of her apartment and strode toward me, hands on hips, her brow a thundercloud of wrath.

"So, O consort of a flea-bitten camel," she snarled, "you thought to play a trick on your little Moorish cousin. For this, O mangy dog, shall your head and shoulders part company this day."

"I but carried out your wishes, ya sitt," I said, feigning bewilderment and great humility. "You feared that His Excellency's favor might be transferred to another, so I brought him to you. Now you reward me with threats and abuse."

But her anger was no whit abated.

"You will soon learn, O great blundering baboon," she predicted, "that Fitnah does not threaten idly. You well knew my desire, yet you brought me this old he-goat, too drunk for aught but sleep. What cared I if he went in to Selma on one night or another? My rule of this harim is ended, in any case, and I am not jealous of his maudlin caresses."

"Could I then disregard the wishes of the Pasha?" I asked. "What do you mean?"

"Why he commanded that I conduct him to his little rosebud. Who, other than you, his favorite, would he name in such endearing terms?"

Fitnah looked at me long and searchingly.

"If this be true," she said, "I will forgive you. If not, your head shall be forfeit. We will know when the master wakens."

She turned and walked off into the majlis, hands on swaying hips, to mingle with the others.

Some three hours later the Pasha poked his ugly, pock-marked phiz and shaven poll out the door and bawled loudly for coffee. A half-dozen girls came running at his call, bearing steaming pots and cups. Among them were Fitnah and Jabala. He squinted down the corridor at me.

"Where is Selma Hanoum?"

he asked. "In the majlis, Excellency," I replied.

"Fetch her," he commanded, and withdrew into the room, followed by the girls.

I went into the majizs and quickly told Selma of what had occurred.

"If Fitnah tells," she whispered, "you must contrive some way to have Musa take your place."

Then, aloud, she said: "Conduct me to His Excellency."

The Pasha was in a vile humor. It was evident that in his long bout with the 'raki he had come off second best. Jabala was bathing his pock-marked brow with cold water while Fitnah poured coffee. The others were standing around, trying to curry favor by looking sympathetic. He tossed off a cup of searing hot coffee, then looked up with his single, bleary eye as I led Selma before him.

"How was it, Selma Hanoum," he demanded, "that you were not in attendance on me when I wakened this morning? Should I, the Pasha, be left alone, to die like a dog, unattended?"

"I leave you, Excellency?" said Selma, with a look of surprize. "I do not understand."

"It was my diwan you shared last evening, my lord," cooed Fitnah, proffering more coffee.

"What!" The Pasha struck the cup from her hand, spattering her with the hot liquid and shattering it on the floor. Then he glared up at me.

"How came you to do this, you filthy blackamoor?" he demanded.

"I but obeyed your Excellency's orders," I replied. "Your command was that I conduct you to your little rosebud. It was my understanding that you meant none other than, Fitnah, your favorite."

"So! You misunderstood! Wallah! We have something strange here."

"I can explain, my lord," said Fitnah.

Cold chills chased up and down my spine as I saw the venomous looks with which she regarded Selma and me.

"Then do so, and make an end of it," growled the Pasha. "I am in no mood for mysteries this morning."

"This man brought you to me,'' continued Fitnah, "because he is an impostor. He is neither Moor nor eunuch, but the lover of Selma Hanoum, whom she has brazenly smuggled into your harim."

It was a bold speech, and I could readily see the craft that lay behind it. For at one stroke, Fitnah planned thus to get rid of both me and her hated rival.

The Pasha's face went livid. For a moment he said nothing, but only glared at me, making little choking noises in his throat.

"Mansur! Get Mansur!' he finally managed to articulate. "We'll soon test the truth of this statement." One of the girls dashed out of the room to call che chief eunuch.

"Permit me to suggest, Excellency," I said, "that Mansur's ministrations might prove embarrassing here before your ladies. With your permission, I will await him in the room across the corridor. In the meantime, I might suggest that you make inquiry of Fitnah as to how she acquired the intimate knowledge that she seems so sure of, and also learn why, if she possessed this knowledge, she did not denounce me before."

With this parting shot, I bowed and withdrew.

Once outside, I leaped across the corridor, entered the room opposite, and softly bolted the door behind me. Then I opened the panel and called Musa. He must have been at the very foot of the ladder, for he arrived at the opening in a few seconds.

"Unbolt the door," I told him, "and wait here. Mansur will come to examine you, for you have been accused of being an impostor— neither a Moor nor a eunuch. Talk no more than necessary, but if you are questioned, remember what I told you of last night's adventures, and stick to the story."

Musa chuckled. "Who accuses me?" he asked.

"You are accused by Fitnah, the Magrhebi dancing-girl," I replied. "'Remember the story. I'll be waiting behind the panel."

While Musa unbolted the door, I crawled through the opening and closed the panel behind me. To my surprize, I saw a small peephole, cut beneath the panel, which I had not noticed from the outside. To this I applied my eye. Scarcely had I done so ere the giant Mansur burst into the room.

Glaring at Musa, he roared: "So! You are neither Magrhebi nor eunuch!"

"On the contrary," said Musa, stripping off his loin-cloth and dropping it to the floor, "I am both." Mansur stared at him for a moment, then laughed uproariously. "Waha!" he exclaimed. "Behold! If I mistake not, the Moorish girl will get forty stripes for her pains."

Just then the Pasha lumbered through the door.

"What's this talk of stripes, Mansur?" he asked, "'and why this boisterous laughter?"'

"Billah!" replied the Nubian, "if this man be not a eunuch then am I a flaxen-haired Ferringeh. Your Excellency can see for yourself that the girl lied."

"Why, so she did,'"' said the Pasha. "The stripes will be in order, Mansur. Lay them on without stint, but take her to a room at the end of the corridor and close the door so her cries will not disturb me."' "Harkening and obedience, Excellency," replied the Nubian, hurrying away with a broad grin on his face. Mohammed turned to Musa. "Resume your loin-cloth, O lord of the bedchamber," he said. "

"Then fetch Selma Hanoum to me here. I like this room better than the other."

"To hear is to obey, my lord," replied Musa, donning his loin-cloth. Then he went out. Swiftly I descended the ladder. Hasan Aga was waiting in the darkness at the bottom.

"What mischief is afoot now?" he asked. "The Pasha has ordered Musa to bring your sister's daughter to the room above," I said. ''The time has come to strike."'

"Agreed," he answered. "Lead on, and I will follow."

vii

I MOUNTED the ladder swiftly, Hasan at my heels. Scarcely had I reached the top and applied my eye to the peephole, ere I saw Musa enter the room with Selma Hanoum. The Pasha was seated on one end of the diwan. As the two came before him, he said:

"Stand guard outside, chamberlain, and close the door. See that I am not disturbed."'

"I hear and obey, Excellency," replied Musa, but looked questioningly at Selma as he said it. She nodded slightly, and he went out. I could see that she was deathly pale. Evidently she had strong faith in those of us who waited behind the panel or she would not have permitted Musa to go.

The Pasha took a bottle of 'raki from the taboret and poured himself a stiff drink. Raising the glass to the girl who stood before him, he said: "With health and gladness!" Then he gulped it down, and seized her wrist. "Sit here beside me, little rosebud," he said. "Be not afraid."

She jerked her arm free, eyes blazing.

"What! You resist me?" he bellowed, leaping to his feet. 'Why then, I'll tame you, little tigress."

Quickly I slid the panel back and sprang through the opening. The Pasha heard me, and half turned, whipping out his simitar.

"Treason!" he shouted. ''Assassins! To me, Mansur! To me, Sa'id!"

With bared blade I leaped at him, intending to stop his mouth for good. I slashed at his bull neck, but his steel was there to meet mine, and he countered with a stroke so swift and sure that only my skill and extreme quickness of wrist averted my entrance into Paradise at that instant. Despite his age and girth, he proved to be a master of cut and parry.

"Fool," he grated. "Think you to best a seasoned swordsman like me? I have slain of youths like you, a thousand save one, and you shall make up the thousand."

Too eager to end the contest with dispatch, I received a slashed shoulder for my carelessness. Presently, however, I managed to bind his blade with mine— a trick I had once learned from a Ferringeh swordsman— and whirling it from his grasp sent it clattering into a corner. Weaponless, and expecting instant death, he sank to his knees, groveling before me, crying:

"Mercy, lord chamberlain! Spare me, and I will make you rich and mighty."

"Bind, gag and hoodwink this whining dog," I told Hasan.

This the aga did with great good will, while I stood over him with the simitar. Meanwhile, I heard the clash of steel on steel outside, and knew that Musa was engaged. I was about to go to his assistance when the noise ceased, and he came in, grinning.

"The fat bowab of the bab al harim attacked me," he said, "but my point raked his cheek, and he turned and ran, screaming that he had been murdered."

"Bolt the door," I told him. But I spoke too late, for at that moment, Mansur rushed through the doorway, brandishing his huge simitar. Swinging his heavy weapon with both hands, the giant Nubian struck at me— a mighty blow that, had it landed, must have split me in twain. But I sidestepped, and brought my blade down on his head with all my might. It bit deep into his wooly skull, and he pitched to the floor without a sound, dead.

Musa sprang to the door and slid the bolt. Outside I could hear the frightened screams of the Harim inmates, the heavy footfalls of running men, and the clank of weapons.

"The guards are coming," I said. "Into the souterrain, all of you. We'll take this fat pig with us. You first, Musa. Then the Pasha, followed by Hasan. I'll follow Selma Hanoum in case they break down the door before we close the panel."

We bundled the bound, gagged and blindfolded Pasha through the opening, and placed his feet on the rounds of the ladder. Then, Musa supporting him from beneath and Hasan steadying him from above, they took him down into the souterrain.

Selma, who had donned her street attire, quickly followed them. The door was splintering beneath the blows of the soldiers as I closed the panel and descended the ladder. At the bottom, Musa took up a lantern he had left there, and led the way between gray stone walls down a dank and musty passageway.

Presently we came to the foot of another ladder. Here Musa passed his lantern to Hasan, and together, he and I got the Pasha up to the top. When we were through the panel opening, the aga and his niece followed. We took the Pasha into Hasan's majlis, and removing his hoodwink and gag, but leaving his hands bound, seated him on the floor.

"I regret, Excellency," said Hasan Aga, "that I can not seat you on a diwan, or even a rug. But, as you can see, your soldiers ate from my house with their usual thoroughness."

The Pasha looked up sullenly. "I'm a man of few words," he said. "Name your price, and let us get down to business."

"As you may have surmised," said Hasan Aga, "we are desirous of leaving Mosul. We will require horses, camels, slaves and traveling equipment, and, let us say, five thousand pounds Turkish."

"Five thousand pounds!" groaned the Pasha. "There is not so much wealth in all my pashalik."

"We will also require your company for at least three days on the road," continued Hasan, "after which you will be given a horse and our blessing."

"Release his hands, that he may write," he told Musa. The eunuch removed his bonds, but before he could begin there came sounds of a tremendous commotion in the street outside.

First we heard much cheering and the barking of dogs. Then came the thunder of hoofbeats, the shouts of riding men, and the clank of weapons. Selma ran to the window— peered out through the lattice.

"No need to bargain with this Cretan dog, now," she said. "It's Cousin Ismail Pasha and his brave riders."

She hurried to the door and flung it wide, then rushed out into the street with Hasan and me hurrying after her in wild excitement. Behind us came the Pasha, with Musa, bared blade in hand, watching him as a cat watches a mouse. "Alhamdolillah!" exclaimed Hasan. "Allah be praised! It is indeed Ismail Pasha!"

The young Pasha, a handsome, richly dressed youth mounted on a prancing jetblack stallion, pulled his steed to a halt before us. Springing lightly from the saddle and tossing his reins to an attendant, he warmly greeted Hasan and Selma.

"I have the firman,"' he said, exhibiting an official-looking packet. "Mohammed Pasha is deposed and I am to govern in his stead until the arrival of the new appointee, Hafiz Pasha."

THE next day, Hasan Aga and I were seated in his refurnished majlis, smoking and sipping coffee. Outside, the rain poured down in torrents, as from the mouths of water-skins. Presently there came a knocking at the door. A moment later a servant ushered in Musa.

Leaving his dripping aba and muddy shoes at the door, he came up, and bowing low before me, said: "Saidi, I bear a message for you from my lady. She bids me inform you that, having rid her house of the Cretan and put it once more in order, she would feel honored if you would visit her this afternoon."

"At what time?" I asked.

"At such time as suits your convenience, my lord," he replied. "Tell her to expect me in half an hour," I told him. He bowed, and withdrew.

A half-hour later, with my cloak drawn tightly about me to keep off the pelting rain, I was picking my way up the muddy street toward Selma's house, when I saw a short, rotund and quite familiar figure hurrying toward me in bedraggled garments, followed by a number of urchins who were shouting insults and pelting him with mud balls. It was Mohammed Pasha.

In order to escape his young tormentors, he dodged into the doorway of a deserted and nearly roofless house. Coming up, I checked the youngsters as they were about to follow him inside. Then, giving them a handful of coppers, I told them to be off.

The deposed Pasha squinted at me without recognition, for I had succeeded in removing most of the walnut juice from my skin and was now dressed with the splendor of an aga, from Hasan's own wardrobe.

"May Allah reward you, said," he said, ''but not as I have been rewarded. Yesterday all those dogs were kissing my feet. Today, every one and every thing falls upon me, even the rain."

He was a picture of dejection, standing there in his wet, mud-stained garments with the water sifting down on him through the leaky roof.

Moving on, I was soon at the door of Selma Hanoum's house, where a slave took my shoes and cloak, and ushered me through the salamlik into the majlis. In a moment, a slender, veiled figure came down the stairs and walked toward me. It was Selma.

"Your slave girl welcomes you to her house, Master," she said, taking my hand and conducting me to a diwan.

Then she clapped her hands, whereupon slaves brought a pipe, coffee things, and a brazier of glowing charcoal. She waved the slaves away, and with her own fair hands lighted the pipe for me. Then she prepared coffee over the glowing brazier while I told her of my meeting with the deposed Pasha.

"It is the justice of Allah," she said. "Through his own misdeeds the Cretan's son has been reduced to beggary. Most folk believe that he deserves worse, but Allah is all-knowing."

She moved a taboret up close to the diwan, and sitting on a cushion before me, poured coffee. Then she handed me a steaming cup. I sipped in silence, waiting for her to speak, for I was positive that she had sent for me that she might purchase her freedom. She was tantalizingly close, and Shaitan tempted me to crush her in my arms. But I forbore.

Presently she asked: "Is there aught else that your slave girl can do for you, Master?"

Allah! How I loved her— desired her above everything in this world or the next. But I knew such thoughts were madness. Returning my cup to the taboret, I stood up.

"Let us have done with this pretense of master and slave, hanoum," I said.

"Why, if you wish, my lord," she replied, also rising. "You bought me at quite a reasonable figure, and I am willing to pay you a good profit on the investment. What do you say to a thousand pounds, Turkish?"

"I say: 'Keep your gold,' " I replied. "For I give you back to yourself, free of all debt or obligation."

"But you are without funds. Surely you will accept a reward for your brave services."

"I have my reward, hanoum. It is better than gold, for it can never be taken from me— better than friendship, for it can never prove false. It is my memory of one beautiful and exquisite rose, which I have seen, loved, and lost."

With that, I turned and strode toward the door. There was a patter of footsteps behind me. A little hand was laid on my arm. I whirled to see her standing there, unveiled in all her loveliness. And in her eyes there shone a light which a man may see but once, yet never misunderstand.

"Oh my Master!' she cried.

"Leave me not desolate!"

Tender, yielding, lovely as a rose pearled with dew, she came to me—gave me her sweet lips.

"Take me, Hamed," she murmured. 'Never let me go. All that I am, all that I have, is yours."

AND SO, effendi, Selma, the one beautiful and exquisite rose, became mine, bringing me happiness indescribable and wealth untold. And we lived together a life of joy and contentment until Allah Almighty saw fit to receive her into His mercy.

Ho, Silat! Bring the sweet and take the full.

__________________

7: The Cape Conspiracy

Owen Oliver

(Joshua Albert Flynn 1863-1933)

Red Book, Sep 1905

WHEN my father died, just as I was leaving Oxford, the estate proved to be heavily encumbered, and I found it necessary to seek a profession. My relatives gave me a deal of advice, but little real help; and I found my lack of experience or special training an absolute bar to anything but poorly paid clerical employment. I had almost resolved to accept a junior master-ship in a school which would put up with indifferent learning for the sake of athletic proficiency, when Mr. Vaughan, of whom I had heard my father speak with great esteem, called to ask whether he could be of any service to me.

He was a “confidential political agent,” he informed me, and had served the Government as such under many names, and in many disguises. During the six weeks that I was with him, he played so many parts, and with such skill, that he seemed to lose his identity in them. Probably this is the reason why I cannot describe him more exactly than as a slight, fair man of about thirty-five, with a small-featured, hairless face, and unusually large, dark eyes.

It was clear that he had a great regard for my father, who, he told me, had helped him with great chivalry at a moment of especial difficulty; and that he had been in his confidence. So when he proposed to employ me as his assistant I jumped at the idea.

“I am afraid I sha’n’t be much use at first,” I warned him, “but I shall improve with practice.”

He smiled.

“You won’t have much time for practice. We sail for the Cape on Saturday in the Dover Castle. I don’t need technical assistance; only courage, honesty and obedience. I’m satisfied. Now as to terms. I’ll pay your expenses and give you £20 a month for pocket money. Otherwise it is a case of payment by results. If we succeed I'll give you £5,000.”

I nearly jumped out of my chair with astonishment.

"You must learn not to show surprise at anything. It’s a good plan to grip something tightly when you expect to be startled.”

I gripped the arms of my chair ostentatiously.

“‘What is the result; and what are the means?” I asked.

“We sha’n’t quarrel about means. As to results— well, I’ll trust your father’s son. The Government wishes to stifle quietly what is known as ‘The Cape Conspiracy’— a gang of the worst rascals in South Africa, where rascals abound. It is primarily an organization for financial purposes, but it uses political means to achieve its ends. It is believed that it aided the Boers during the war, and tried to obtain foreign intervention; and that it is now fostering enmity to the British rule in South Africa. Our object is to obtain proof of this. For reasons of state it is not desirable to proceed openly against the members, and I doubt if they will be punished even if we obtain the proof; but the Government would then have sufficient hold over them to quash the business.

“The incriminating papers are practically known to be in the possession of Count Ossoski, a Pole— the worst scoundrel of the whole gang; the worst scoundrel of all the scoundrels I have ever known. I have reason to know him. He is now in England; but the association wants the papers at Johannesburg, as they include certain financial agreements between the members. If we were an enlightened country, like Russia, we should simply seize Master Ossoski and take the papers. As we aren’t— I am employed. Is there anything else you’d like to know?”

“No,” I said, "only— I’m not worth what you offer.”

He laid his hand on my shoulder.

‘There are two reasons why I make you so large an offer. In the first place, I wish to help you for your father’s sake. In the second place, I would give every penny I possess— I am not a poor man— to succeed in this undertaking. I am not usually revengeful; but I have terrible cause to hate Ossoski— cause such as you could never guess. He is clever and unscrupulous, and I consider it necessary to have an assistant upon whose courage and loyalty I can absolutely rely. I expect these qualities, as a matter of course, from your father’s son. Now, I have told you all I can. Wilk you come?”

Of course I will come,” I said. ‘‘Give me my instructions. ”

“Here is £100 to meet preliminary expenses. Book to Cape Town by Saturday’s mail. I shall be aboard, but I shall be disguised, and you won’t recognize me. Just make friends and enjoy yourself. When I need you, I will use one word— Visionary. Don’t show surprise, but find an opportunity of speaking to me alone. Take a revolver. We may have to run risks. Above everything, hold your tongue. You can tell your friends that you are going to try your luck in South Africa— they won’t see anything suspicious in that. We’ll have a good time together, because—” He changed suddenly from his crisp manner to almost feminine gentleness, “we like one another!”

“Yes,” I said emphatically.

Then he went.

I made my arrangements as he had directed; and on the following Saturday we started from Southampton, followed by great flocks of screaming sea-gulls.

THERE WERE some two hundred passengers in the first saloon of the Dover Castle, and I suspected about fifty in turn of being Vaughan, but when we were a week past Madeira I had utterly failed to detect him. This did not prevent me from enjoying the voyage. I played in all the deck cricket and tournaments, danced all the dances, fell in love with Lucy Hardy, and took a violent dislike to Ossoski, a thin-lipped, sandy-haired man, with an evil smile, and a thin, grating voice, who made friends with nobody.

On the evening of the thirteenth day out, I was leaning on the rail, looking at the sea, just after Lucy had gone below for the night, when little Mrs. Filmer— one of the nicest of my many acquaintances— stopped beside me.

“Your thoughts are worth more than a penny, I suppose?” she asked in her bright, pleasant way.

“If they come true,” I agreed. thinking of Lucy, of course.

“I sincerely hope they will,” she said. “You see, I know them. You can’t hope to disguise yourself aboard ship, unless you’re a—visionary!”

I stifled an exclamation and stared at her. It had occurred to me that Vaughan might be disguised as a female— one of the spectacled, blue-veiled ladies of advanced views— but I could scarcely believe even now that this pretty, lady-like, feminine creature could be a man, although I could detect a resemblance to Vaughan in her features now that I looked for it.

We did not speak for a whole minute. Then she— as I had to call him— laughed.

“You are very properly discreet,” she said. ‘We shall need discretion. If I am not naistaken, Ossoski suspects me,”

“Does he know you? As yourself, I mean?”

“He does not know me as Vaughan. He suspects that I am Ralph Venning, a cousin of his wife. I am rather like him. I'll be candid with you. Two years ago, before I had taken to this profession, I entered Ossoski’s rooms to obtain a certain document for his wife’s friends. It was one that they had a right to— a forged certificate of her death.”

“Is she dead?”

“It is generally believed so. However, that’s immaterial. I was made up to look as much like Venning as possible. He was away abroad, and could prove an alibi if he were suspected. I obtained the document and others— sufficient to keep the Countess’s property from her husband— but Ossoski met me just outside the house as I was going away. When he missed the papers, he moved heaven and earth to find Venning; but I had become Vaughan. Now he suspects me, and he has people at the Cape who would profess to identify me with Venning— or anybody else. My disguise would be against me, and— well, there are other things that I can’t tell you. You'd better keep out of it.”

“Not while I can be of service to you,” I said stoutly. ‘What shall I do?”

"He does not suspect you. Watch him when he is watching me, and— here comes somebody. Chaff me about the moon— my eyes— anything. This saucy boy is behaving dreadfully, Mrs. Green Oh! I’m an old woman, you know. He’s just keeping his hand in— Good night.”

The next day I was talking to the Count when “Mrs. Filmer” passed with a smile and a nod. He scowled after her.

“Introduce me to her,” he asked abruptly.

“I— I hardly know her well enough,” I demurred.

He shrugged his shoulders. reached us again he bowed.

“May I take a traveler’s privilege to introduce myself?” he asked politely.

She tapped on the deck with her foot, and smiled at him archly, as she consented. I could not help admiring Vaughan’s composure, as, after a few commonplaces, they walked away together. It was evident that neither wished for my company, so I went to Lucy. Half an hour later “Mrs. Filmer” came and chatted merrily to us. Incidentally, she termed me a “visionary.” There was a dance that night, and I promptly asked her for the first waltz. It was “Myosotis,” and I shall always hear it mingled with the terrified voice of a woman; for so convincing was Vaughan’s disguise, that I could only think of him as such.

“‘He’s found me out, Frank, found me out. It isn’t just failure. It’s—oh! It’s worse than I can tell you— worse than you can dream. Ssh! He’s coming. Talk nonsense.— Fie, you naughty man! I’m sure it’s natural! He says he’ll have me apprehended at Cape Town. I’m at his mercy, unless— Ssh! Someone will hear. Quite the handsomest man aboard, I think. It’s nothing wrong on my part, but if you knew all, dear boy, you’d pity me.— No, I can’t tell you. —Thanks! I think I left my wrap in the corner seat— Don’t think badly of me. Read this, then tear it up.— —Ours is the next, is it, doctor? Would you mind sitting it out? I've something to tell you.”

I was engaged for every other dance. She was engaged in earnest conversation with the doctor till she suddenly disappeared. So I did not speak to her again. The last dance was with Lucy; and we sat on deck for some time afterwards. When she retired, I thought it wise to go to the smoking room as usual. Ossoski invited me to drink, and I rallied him on. not getting a dance with Mrs. Filmer; but he laughed softly. His laugh was a warning against the man.

“She is not clever enough for me,” he said complacently.

Then I pleaded sleepiness and went below. I had a cabin to myself, and I fastened the door before I opened Vaughan’s letter. It contained bank notes for £100, and this message in pencil:

Do not intervene without the word, even if you think my life depends on it. If anything happens to me, find out what hotel Ossoski is staying at and stay there, too. Find out when he travels to Jo’burg. When you have done so, walk along Government Avenue at 10 A. M., 4 or 10 o’clock at night, wearing a flower in your buttonhole. Destroy this note.

Under no circumstances take action without the word. Everything depends on your implicit obedience.

The next day “Mrs. Filmer” did not appear. The following afternoon everyone was horrified to hear that she had died suddenly of heart failure.

“Fortunately,” the doctor told me, “we reach Cape Town tomorrow, so we can bury her ashore. She recovered for a few moments before the end. Her last instructions were to tell you that she hoped to meet you again some day. Poor woman!”

It flashed upon me in a moment that Vaughan was not dead, but shamming, and that when we reached Cape Town the next day he hoped to escape.

The following morning I was awakened by the hooting of fog horns. Nothing was visible through the port holes but a dense mist. When the steward brought my tea, he said that we were to anchor in the bay, and defer landing till the fog lifted. At luncheon time it was thicker than ever, and the good old captain made us a little speech.

“We have had many pleasant functions,” he said, “on the voyage. The last is a very sad one. It is impossible to keep any longer the remains of the poor lady who has left us, and I have been unable to arrange to land them. So they will find their last home in the sea. The law requires that the burial shall take place not less than three miles from the shore, I am therefore sending a boat. When they have had time to row a sufficient distance, I shall commence tolling a bell, and shall continue doing this at intervals to guide them back. The undertaking is not without risk, and I ask your prayers for their safe return. The service will take place after they have left the ship.”

All heads were bowed for a few moments. Then the passengers slowly rose and passed out. Most of the ladies were wiping their eyes; and the men looked pale and depressed. "Mrs. Filmer” had been a general favorite on board. Ossoski alone looked cheerful. He made some jesting remark to me, but I brushed him angrily aside, and went to my cabin to think out the situation. From Vaughan’s note and his farewell message through the doctor I had conjectured that he was only shamming death, and intended either to ‘come to” from his pretended trance when the passengers had landed, or after he had been carried ashore. As it was, he would probably think he was merely being taken to land till he found himself in the sea. His orders to me were positive enough—"Do not intervene without the word, even if you think my life depends upon it ”—and my confidence in him was so great that I would have obeyed him in any event that he could have conceivably foreseen; but it was not possible that he could have forseen this. I wavered between confiding in the captain and going in the boat to try and give him some hint if he were alive in the ghastly bundle. Finally I decided upon the latter. and went in search of the chief officer.

“When does the— it go?” I asked huskily, when I found him.

He drew a deep breath and took my arm.

“We knew how everyone would feel about it,” he said, “‘so we sent it off while you were at lunch. Hark!”’

The bell began tolling. I staggered and nearly fell. Dead or alive, Vaughan was in the sea!

I had a lingering hope that he might have discovered what was happening, and announced the fact that he was alive to those in the boat; but when it came back, it brought only a pale young officer and wild-eyed sailors, who trembled as they reached the deck. The bundle did not sink readily, they said, and some of them declared that they saw the canvas with its load drifting behind them all the way back, as if it were chasing them.

The captain pooh-poohed the idea, and said it was only the fog that had shaken their nerves. He gave orders for a special grog ration, but the sailors still went about shaking their heads. The ladies were tearful, and the men silent. I went below again and sat shuddering and shivering on my berth. I dared not look out of my port-hole for fear of a shapeless bundle that I pictured bobbing up and down on the waters through the fog.

The fog cleared up during the night, and we landed early the next morning? I found that Ossoski was going to the "Mount Nelson” and followed him there, determined to obey Vaughan’s instructions to the letter. It relieved my feelings to do something that he had wished; and I thought it just possible that he had written to some confederate ashore, who might know the sign agreed upon and have some further orders for me. On the Saturday after we landed, Ossoski mentioned that he-was going up country on Monday night. I put a rose in my buttonhole and walked down the avenue at ro in the morning and 4 in the afternoon. In the evening I went to see Lucy, who was staying with her brother out at Sea Point, but excused myself at half past nine. I got off the tram at the end of the avenue, and walked up it punctually to time. An old Boer gentleman with a long white beard stopped me in the middle of the avenue.

“Visionary!” he muttered.

“You are a friend of V—” I checked the word, and he laughed in a voice that made my heart thump. It was Vaughan!

“His best friend, and his worst !— Good boy!”

We seized one another’s hands and pumped them for a full minute. When I told him how I proposed to go in the boat, and couldn’t, and how I felt about it, he nearly wrung my hand off.

“The doctor and his man worked it,” he explained. ‘They put some old rubbish in the bundle and hid me down below— a beastly, damp, dark hole, that smelt horribly of vile water. I felt as if I might be dead. Ugh!— They got me off in the afternoon. It cost £1,000. The doctor wouldn’t have done it for that if I hadn’t pointed out that for my own sake I could never reappear.”

“What!” I cried. ‘You mean to disappear altogether?”

“I must. It won’t be the first time.” He laughed bitterly. "Well, when does he go?”

“Monday night. He has a reserved compartment. I’ve taken a berth in the next one.”

“Take the whole compartment. At the station a worthy old Boer— Dr. Von Ry— will appeal to you to allow him to share it. You will reluctantly consent. We will arrange our plans on the journey. Walk here tomorrow night with another flower if it’s arranged all right. It must be arranged if it costs another £1,000. If you want money, come here in the afternoon. Good night, old chap.”

I obtained the compartment, and signified the fact as directed, and we set out from Cape Town on Monday night. Our compartment and Ossoski’s were those which are usual in the first class carriages of the Cape Government Railway. The seats formed two sleeping berths, and the upper berths folded up against the sides when not required. The windows had wooden shutters to keep out the sun, and each compartment had a long narrow table with flaps between the seats. They opened upon the corridor with sliding doors, which could be bolted at night, when the doors could, however, be opened from outside by the guard’s key. The carriages had high roofs, with ventilating passages at each side, above the carriage proper. At the end of the carriage there was a little platform in the open air, and one could pass by a flexible platform with netted side-rails from one carriage to another. The reason of this description will appear later.

As soon as we closed the door for the night, Vaughan abandoned his assumed character; but he did not speak of Ossoski till the following morning, when he asked me to take an opportunity of engaging him in conversation on the platform.

I sat beside Ossoski at breakfast at Matjesfontein, and tried to engage his sympathy, by complaining of the stuffy habits of the Boer whom I had allowed to share my compartment. He informed me curtly that a good natured fool was the worst fool in the world, and made it clear that he did not wish for further conversation. In the afternoon, however, the heat drove him out on the platform, and he seemed glad to have some one to listen to his abuse of the scenery.

“Hills and ant-hills; scrub and stones!” he growled. ‘‘That’s the country you’ve spent millions of pounds and thousands of lives for!”

When I returned to my seat “Dr. Von Ry” appeared to be fast asleep, and he only spoke in broken English till we closed the door at half past ten.

Then he produced a bottle like a two pound glass jam jar, with a cork fitted in it, and a very long india rubber tube running through the cork; also two packets of crystals, and a large flask of water.

“This bottle,” he said, emphasizing his words with his forefinger, "will shortly coniain a narcotic gas. When he has had time to go to sleep, I shall inject the gas into the ventilator. While you were talking to him, I ascertained with your stick that it runs along both compartments. The air coming in from outside will blow the gas into his.”

“It will not kill him?” I asked quickly.

He shrugged his shoulders.

“It will not even stupefy him for long. I shall use a little chloroform when I go in. I have a guard’s key. When I have found what I want, I shall bind and gag him. The guard will find him at seven o’clock in the morning. I get off at De Aar at midnight. I have friends there. It is all arranged.”

“How about me?”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to be bound and gagged too. It isn’t nice, but I’m afraid it’s the only way to avert suspicion. You will make out that you’ve been drugged, of course. Say that you half woke, and heard a noise as if wheels were whizzing round, and felt as if you had a weight on your head. When you came to, you found yourself bound and gagged. You had a headache, and a coppery taste in your mouth, and felt sick. No one will suspect you— or look for the papers in your pocket!”

“What!” I cried. "Am I to keep them? —All right. What am I to do with them?”

“Take them to England, and deliver them to the person I told you of. Use the word, and he will pay you £10,000. I’ll write to you about my share.”

“But why not take the papers yourself?”

“For two reasons. First, I shall never return to England. I am ‘dead’ and intend to remain so. Secondly, I shall probably be caught and searched.”

“But if they catch you, and Ossoski can prove things against you? How will you get away then?”

He laughed. “He cannot prove anything against me up here. His witnesses are at Cape Town. Also, I’ve a card that he little suspects, to play. No, I can’t tell you.” He looked me right in the eyes. “I am running straight with you, dear boy.”

“I never doubted that,” I told him. “I’m ready.”

After listening several times at Ossoski’s door he pronounced him asleep. He mixed the chemicals with water, and bubbles of sweet smelling gas—something like the laughing gas of the dentist—oozed out before he fitted in the cork. Then he stood on the table, and pushed the india-rubber tube along the ventilating passage. After a few minutes he got down and went out, taking a little bag in his hand. I heard Ossoski’s door slide open, and close again.’ Then I heard a heavy fall. The truth flashed on me in a moment. Vaughan had himself been overpowered by the gas. I rushed into the passage and tried to open Ossoski’s door. Vaughan had fastened it behind him!

I stood gazing vacantly at the door for a few seconds. If I burst it open, the noise would wake everyone. If I did not, everything depended on whether Ossoski or Vaughan woke first— presumably it would be Ossoski, as he was drugged first, and more gradually. I took out my penknife and tried to cut around the edge of a panel, but the knife was too blunt, or the wood too hard. Then I fetched my walking stick, and pressed it steadily against the panel near the keyhole. After some effort I broke through without much noise. The gas rushed out and made me feel faint, but I opened the opposite window in the corridor to let it out, and tore away enough of the panel to get my hand in, and unlatch the door. Then I dragged Vaughan back to his berth and dabbled his face with a wet towel. There was water in the lavatory. In a minute or two he opened his eyes. Before I had finished telling him what I had done, he staggered to his feet.

“What a fool I was!” he said. "Stop here. Yes, yes, I’m all right.” He shut me in again. I heard him stumbling around in Ossoski’s compartment, and waited in an agony of suspense for fear the conductor should come round and notice the rent in the door. To my relief, Vaughan returned very quickly. He had a small flat package of papers which he handed to me.

“Now, I must tie you up,” he said. “Don’t be alarmed. I give you my word it will be all right. Remember that you have been drugged. We’re nearly at De Aar now. If the guard comes round I'll stand with my back against the hole in the door. That’s it. Now the gag.” He smiled at me and stroked my hair gently. “Good bye, dear boy, and good luck to you and your Lucy. You'll be very happy together. Keep my half of the reward for a wedding present.— Good bye!”

He went out, leaving me stretched helplessly on the seat. Presently I heard: him talking to the conductor. Then the train slowed down and stopped. I heard the baggage being moved about, and the jabbering of Kaffirs on the platform. Trunks were taken off the train, and others put on with a bang. Then the train went on. I began to feel cramped, and horrible doubts came into my mind whether I might be undiscovered, and left there to choke or starve. Then I heard the conductor shouting in the corridor; then a rush of footsteps, and a commotion in Ossoski’s compartment. In a few moments the conductor and some passengers burst in upon me.

“It’s that rascally Boer,” the conductor cried. ‘I always had my suspicions about him. He’s murdered both these poor gents, and robbed them.”

They untied me, sat me up, and sluiced my face with water. I pretended to come to slowly, and sat back against the corner, trying to look dazed. They stopped the train and fetched a doctor from another carriage. He brought Ossoski to, after we had been backed into De Aar. He described his symptoms as I had described mine. The only difference, the doctor said, was that he had been drugged more heavily.

Ossoski explained volubly that he believed “Dr. Von Ry” to be a man named Venning who had come out in the Dover Castle disguised as a woman, and was supposed to have died on board, but had probably only shammed death and escaped. He evidently had no suspicions of me. The police, however, insisted that I must stop at De Aar for the present, to help to identify the Boer, if he was caught.

An hour after breakfast they reported that they had found his clothes and his big bag in the field. Just after lunch they brought in a slight, nervous, rather pretty lady. I felt quite sure that she was Vaughan. Ossoski shook his fist at her, and swore that she was ‘‘Venning”’ alias “Mrs. Filmer.” He sneered at me when I denied any resemblance to the latter.

“He’s probably made away with the papers,” Ossoski said, ‘‘but the fact that he’s a man in disguise will be enough for you.”

“Quite enough,” said the head policeman. "I’ve no doubt in my own mind about it.”

The conductor said that he had no doubt, and so said most of the passengers; but the lady, who called herself Mrs. Leicester, insisted with tearful indignation that it was all a mistake. Finally she demanded to be searched by some ladies. Four matrons who were on the train undertook the task, and she retired with them to one of the station offices. The police officer waited with great inportance outside the door, and Ossoski walked up and down on the platform, twitching his skinny hands with impatience.

After about ten minutes the police officer came forward, followed by “Mrs. Leicester,” looking flushed and triumphant, and by four indignant ladies.

“You’d best apologize,” he advised. ‘There are no papers, and he— that is she — is a lady. There’ll be a row about this. Thad my doubts all along.”

Ossoski showed his teeth and snarled like a vicious dog.

“It’s a lie,” he shouted. “You're all in league with her!"

The four ladies bridled up with one accord.

“Perhaps you'll inform this— this man — who I am,” said the one who had taken the lead.

The police officer drew Ossoski a little aside.

“She’s the wife of Sir Ewan Jones,” he declared in a hoarse whisper, “‘and two of the others are the wives of high officials. If you don’t apologize there’ll be trouble. ”

Ossoski stared at them with his lips drawn back from his large yellow teeth.

“If this is a woman,” he snarled, “Venning was a woman. It’s Venning. I won’t apologize. They lie!”

The ladies started a shrill clamor, and the police officer began to pull Ossoski away rather roughly, but "Mrs. Leicester” interceded.

“I do not think he is responsible for his actions,” she said sweetly. "What did you say his name was? Ossoski? Now I remember. He’s mad. His wife had to leave him. Her maiden name was Venning, and—”

Ossoski gave a sudden yell and sprang at her; but the police officer and I caught him.

“It is my wife!” he yelled. “My wife— Don’t let her go.—She’s my wife, I tell you!”

“I told you he was quite mad,” she whispered. ‘‘Hadn’t I better humor him? Yes, I’m your wife. Of course, I’m your wife, dear?”

He tried again to spring at her, but the police officer held him firmly.

“Come along with me,” he said. “I’ll find you a nice compartment to yourself; and someone to look ajter you!”

And in spite of his protests, he was forced into the train and taken to Johannesburg, leaving “Mrs. Leicester” on the platform waving her hand.

THE GREAT PERSONAGE who took the papers and gave me the reward supplied what little remains of the story.

“Ossoski,” he said, “had a charming English wife whom he treated badly. About three years ago she disappeared. Some people said that he had killed her; others that she had run away from his ill usage. He said that she was dead; but that the proofs of her death had been stolen from his rooms by one Venning, her cousin, who could not be found. Apparently she was Venning, and Venning became Vaughan, and I imagine that your father, who knew her people, befriended her.— Anyhow we shall hear no more of the Cape Conspiracy; and I doubt if you’ll ever hear any more of her.”

There he was wrong, as even great personages sometimes are. For a year later Ossoski died, and the Countess reappeared at my wedding to Lucy. She was an old friend of my father’s, she explained, and my wife is as fond of her as I am. Her portrait stands on my desk now— a slight, beautiful woman, with wonderful eyes; and underneath is written in her hand—

A strong friend and a strong foe, and ever your friend.

PAULINE Ossoski.

Lucy smiles when she reads the inscription.

“It shows how people deceive themselves about themselves,” she says. “She couldn’t hurt a fly— our dear Pauline!”

But I have not told even Lucy the story of the Cape Conspiracy!

______________________

8: A Black Diamond

Marianne Kent

1856-1942

Strand Magazine, Nov 1895

IT was a dull spring morning when the great steamer Nelson, which for the past four weeks had been making its way from Calcutta, came within sight of Southampton. The men at the look-out had seen the land long before the unaccustomed eye could discern it even through a glass. But, as the morning mists cleared away suddenly, a long belt of coast appeared, and very soon the harbour and its surroundings were plainly visible. Many of the passengers had gathered on deck, each eager to catch the first glimpse of land. There were sunburnt soldiers, some of whom had not been in their native land for years, and who thought wistfully of the changes time had made in the homes to which they were returning. There were delicate, fair-haired children, watched over by anxious mothers, whose hearts were torn with the conflicting thoughts of the husbands they had left behind them, and of the little ones they were so soon to abandon to a stranger's care.

As I stood among the little group and watched the eager faces all turned in one direction, I told myself that, perhaps, none of them would be quite so glad to reach their journey's end as I. One is apt to reason in this fashion, for to each his own concerns seem of so much more consequence than those that engross his neighbour. Still, my egotistical reflection was, in a measure, true, for to me the landing at Southampton meant more than that a safe passage from India had been accomplished. It meant that the goal had been reached on which every thought and hope had been centred for months past. It meant that a mission upon which my future career depended had been triumphantly carried through. It meant to me, in fact, the difference between success and failure.

During my five-and-thirty years of life I had gone through many varied experiences, but none that had caused me so much anxiety of mind as this voyage home from Calcutta. My fellow-passengers on board the steamer little knew the responsibility with which I was weighted— that if I had found a watery grave, 80,000 would have gone to the bottom with me, and Brassington, the well-known firm of London jewellers, would have been unable to fulfil a Royal comission for a wedding present for a Princess. For more than ten years I had been in the employment of the Messrs. Brassington, and although they had always treated me with confidence, sending me out to India to complete the purchase of an historical diamond belonging to an Eastern Rajah was the highest mark of distinction they had ever paid me. I can recall the thrill of delight that passed through me when the elder Brassington, the chief of the firm, called me into his room, and after speaking of the negotiations that had been going on concerning the diamond, said:—

"Mr. Fenton, we have decided to intrust you with the responsible task of fetching it from India."

My fellow-clerks, if a trifle envious of my preferment, were loud in their congratulations, declaring that "old Dick" was in luck's way — that his fortune was made ! Indeed, I was somewhat of that way of thinking myself, for I reflected that if I carried out my mission successfully I should never again be ranked with the other clerks, but should, in all probability, be given a junior partnership in the flourishing firm of Brassington and Co. With these sanguine and ambitious thoughts in my head, I went out to the East, where I executed my instructions to the letter and secured the costly bauble, which was a magnificent stone, the size of a large hazel-nut. Under my coat and waistcoat I wore a strong leather belt, in which was a small pouch, or pocket, and in this I was to carry the diamond home. I had resolved that the belt should never leave me day or night until I had delivered my precious charge to my employers.

After the diamond came into my possession I had an anxious time of it before embarking at Calcutta. For the sale of the stone was soon noised about, and the natives there are a crafty, cunning set, jewellery having an attraction for them such as a magnet has for a needle. However, I managed to elude all would-be plunderers, and went on board the steamer feeling that, if only the elements were propitious, I had nothing more to fear. On the whole, the voyage home was a fair one, and once in sight of Southampton I felt elated, as one who knows that a victory is secured.

On landing, I had to make my way to a jeweller in the town, who was an agent of our firm, and to whom Mr. Brassington had promised a sight of the diamond en route. After I had interviewed this man, I had only to choose a convenient train and make the best of my way to London, where I hoped to arrive before our business establishment closed for the night, and so rid myself of all further responsibility.

As I passed from the steamer with the other passengers, I noticed a tall, black man, who, strangely enough, I never remembered to have encountered during the voyage. He was dressed in a shabby suit of European clothes, but he had a striking resemblance to a native servant of the Rajah from whom I had bought the diamond. The man had an evil-looking face, and I had a strong suspicion that he had designs for robbing me of the stone, for he had dogged my footsteps as I made my way from his master's palace to Calcutta. However, on reflection, I felt that the Rajah's servant and the man who disembarked with me at Southampton could hardly be the same. For, while the first had lost no opportunity of following me with his cunning, watchful eyes, the latter passed me without a gleam of recognition, and was soon lost in the crowd upon the harbour.

I made my way at once to Mr. French, the first jeweller in Southampton, and was annoyed to find that he was from home. I was only instructed to show the diamond to him, so that I was forced to await his return, and this prevented me from catching the early train I had fixed upon, and I found that I should be unable to leave for London until the evening express.

I wandered about Southampton, had some refreshments, and went back to the jeweller's early in the afternoon, where I found Mr. French expecting me. He was a melancholy little man, one of those odd creatures who, dissatisfied with life themselves, try to make others see things from their gloomy point of view. He admired the diamond, as in duty bound, but when I was expressing my pleasure at having brought it over in safety, he said, with a sinister smile:—

"Ah! my dear sir, don't exult before you are out of the wood! You have some miles farther to carry your treasure, and there is time for many things to happen on the road!"

Having made me feel depressed, to say the least of it, by these remarks, he followed them by a cheering anecdote.

"Ah!" he said, shaking his head, "how well I remember poor Foley bringing the Countess of Blank's rubies from New York. It is true he was a garrulous Irishman, and unable to keep his business to himself. Any way, he was followed, I believe, all the way from America, and was found in a ditch a few miles out of London, with his throat cut, and every vestige of the jewels gone!"

In my position this was not a comfortable tale to hear. Mr. French watched me critically for a few moments, and then inquired if I carried firearms? I replied that I had not done so since I went on board the steamer. He assured me that this was a great mistake. He was so positive about it, that I was induced to go out with shim and purchase a revolver before going to the train. I parted from my new friend with a sense of relief, and tried to shake off the gloomy fears with which he had infected me. I went to the railway book-stall and laid in a stock of papers to beguile my journey. Who is there who revels in a daily paper as an Englishman but just returned from abroad?

I chose my seat in the train— a small, second-class compartment— and then, my head still running on Mr. French's stories, decided to secure the carriage to myself. I flung my rug and papers upon the seat and walked down the platform in search of the guard. Slipping something into the hand of that intelligent individual, I desired him to see that I was left undisturbed. He came back with me and, when I had taken my seat, locked the carriage door, and I settled myself comfortably in a corner, feeling a sense of security that I had not experienced for some time. Many an impatient hand tried the door before the train left the station, but without being able to effect an entrance, and I steamed out of Southampton in solitary state.

There was still sufficient daylight for me to read by. I turned over my papers and selected my favourite, and leant back on the cushions to enjoy it at my leisure. As I did so, it seemed to me that the revolver in my pocket stuck out at an unpleasant angle. Now I must confess to a weakness, and that is an intense dislike to weapons of all kinds. As Bon Gualtier expresses it, "I have a wholesome horror both of powder and of steel," so I drew the revolver from my pocket and placed it on the seat beside me. It was not a wise thing to do, as a sudden lurch of the train might have sent it flying off, when the mischief would have been done. However, this was what I did, and then I resumed my reading with redoubled relish.

For some quarter of an hour I was buried in an article, but at the end of that time I laid the paper down and glanced about me. Then I became aware of an extraordinary fact: the revolver had disappeared. At first I was incredulous. I looked on the seats on either side of me, I felt in my pockets to see if I could have replaced it there, but it was not to be seen. And as I sat dazed and bewildered, the horrible conviction forced itself upon me that I was not alone, that someone was concealed beneath the seat and had been locked in with me. It was a hideous thought. I sat motionless, making no sign, trying to face the position I was in as bravely as I could.

I told myself at last, that whoever was in hiding could have no possible designs on me. It was but a chance that I had selected the carriage where some unfortunate creature was already concealed : someone, perhaps, who was being pursued and in want of a weapon of self-defence, and who therefore had been unable to resist the temptation offered by my revolver. That must be it! My hopes began to revive as I reasoned out this theory. I did not touch the alarm bell, not knowing in what quarter of the carriage my mysterious companion might be, thinking he would doubtless spring upon me to prevent my making the signal. If my notion of the felon wishing to escape were correct, I felt that by keeping still I might reach the place where the train stopped for the first time in safety.

I need not say that I was unable to continue my reading. I sat with a paper held in my hand, staring fixedly before me. I don't know what length of time passed when, suddenly, I felt something touch my foot. Without moving my body in the least, I bent my head and looked down, and what I saw sent a thrill through me, that was felt in every nerve. On the floor, close to my foot, was a hand, and the hand was black! Then for a certainty I knew that I was in the deadliest peril ; that I was alone and unarmed at the mercy of the malignant wretch who had followed me from the far East with the fixed determination of securing the diamond. I felt that he was trying to slip a cord about my feet and so render me more helpless. It was a hideous dream, a grim nightmare from which each moment I expected to awake. But I seemed doomed. No chance of escape was possible. Death stared me in the face. Still, whatever my failings may be, I am no coward, therefore I resolved that if die I must, I would die game.

I gathered all my strength together and, with a sudden movement, caught that dusky hand and dragged the Indian from his hiding-place. My attack was so unexpected that he had not time to get at the revolver, which he had evidently thrust into his breast while he was busy with the cord. I saw my advantage in this, and clung to his right hand with desperate energy. But the brute was on me like a panther. He was a big, powerful man, with far more physical strength than I possessed, and from the first I saw that my case was hopeless; nevertheless, the struggle was a fierce one.

In reality, I suppose, it lasted but a few seconds, yet I had time to ask myself, more than once, what the end would be, little imagining the strange termination that was at hand. All at once, without any warning, the train dashed headlong into some great obstacle in its path. There was a terrible crash, and then the carriage we were in collapsed— crushed and splintered as a nut between the crackers.

The first lurch the train gave had separated me from my enemy. I knew not what had been his fate. As for myself, I was buried in the debris of the carriage. My right side (both arm and leg) was terribly crushed. The pain. was too acute to allow of my quite losing consciousness, although I was dazed and stupefied. For the last half-hour I had been trying to face death bravely, feeling that my end was near, so that, in a measure, I was spared the terrible panic that filled the rest of the passengers in the train. I could hear their frantic, agonized cries for help. I could hear the hurried footsteps of those who went to their aid, and now and then I could see the flickering light of the lanterns they carried. But I heard and saw all in an indistinct way, not realizing exactly where I was or what was going on. At times I fell into a stupor, from which the pain in my crushed limbs roused me and brought me back to life once more.

After a while the wood that weighed upon me was lifted, and kindly faces looked down at me, expressing pity for my condition. I must have fainted when they tried to raise me, for when I next remembered anything, I was being carried along in the dark, with the feeble light of a lantern bobbing up and down before me. Again there was a blank, and when I next came to myself I was lying in a bed in a small place which had evidently been hastily arranged as a hospital for the wounded.

I felt weak and shattered by all I had gone through, and sank back on my pillows with a sigh of relief. Close to the bed a gentleman was standing, who I supposed was a doctor, and at a little distance was a nurse in a white cap. I took in all these details in a dreamy way, when suddenly, with a rush that sent my heart into my mouth, came the recollection of the diamond. What had become of it ? My right arm, which must have been very badly broken and was now in splints, was quite useless. I could not move it in the least. With my left hand, which was also bruised and strained, I was able to feel that the leather belt was still about me, but the pocket, in which the stone was, was under my wounded arm. In the condition I was in, it was impossible for me to get at it, turn and twist as I might.

The doctor must have heard my restless movements, for he came and looked down at me inquiringly. He had a shrewd, kindly face, which I felt I could trust, and I explained my trouble to him. I spoke in a low tone, and as briefly as possible. It was a strange story— although I made no mention of the Indian— and my listener might have thought it the ravings of delirium, but on slipping his hand under me, as I directed, he felt the pocket in the belt and assured me that the stone was there.

"But you are hardly in a fit state to guard your treasure," he said; "shall I take charge of it until you can resume your journey?"

I thanked him warmly, but declared it was impossible that I could part with it for a moment. I know I was very excited when I said it, for I felt my temples throbbing, and my tongue seemed hardly able to form the words. The doctor watched me critically for a moment, and then, as he laid his hand upon my pulse, said soothingly:—

"Never mind, do not distress yourself. Perhaps, after all, it is better as it is. For who knows of the stone's existence? So put your fears aside and try to get well."

He poured something into a glass and gave it to me, and very soon I forgot all my troubles in a long, dreamless sleep.

It was in the cold darkness of early dawn that I awoke once more and gazed about me. I felt far more myself than I had done before I slept, and able to take an interest in the things about me. I noticed, now, that there were three beds in the room. The one on my left was empty; doubtless the poor creature it had contained had died and been removed while I slept. The room was only lighted by one feeble night-light, so that at first it was not easy for me to distinguish the different objects. But after a while, as my eyes became accustomed to the dimness, I turned to get a better view of the bed on my right, and see who my companion in affliction might be. And there on the white pillow I saw the black head of my treacherous enemy!

I was very weak from all the pain I had undergone, and in that first moment I was paralyzed with fear— fear that had been a stranger to me during all that had happened in the train. My first impulse was to cry out for assistance, but I reflected that there would only be the nurses about, and they would be certain to think me delirious. Then, again, it was evident that the black man had not recognised me. So I summoned up the little courage I had left, and resolved to remain perfectly still, keeping my head turned away so that those crafty, cruel eyes should not see me. I don't know how much time passed, I only know that as I lay there my heart beat like a sledge-hammer, and the bed-clothes rose and fell with each labouring breath I drew.

At last a nurse stole softly into the room, and seeing I was awake gave me some medicine. I whispered an entreaty that she would not leave me. She smiled assent, and took a chair by my side. There must have been some narcotic in the mixture, for I had scarcely swallowed it than I fell asleep again, and then I suppose the nurse departed to look after some patient in an adjoining room.

It was feeling stealthy hands moving the bed-clothes about me that at length brought me back to consciousness, and looking up I saw that dark, evil face bending over me. Before I had time to utter a sound a heavy hand was laid upon my mouth, and the leather belt, which had evidently just been cut through, was dragged from me, and the next instant the Indian was stealing towards the window. Then I shouted as loudly as I could for help, but even as I did so, the black man was through the window and had disappeared in the darkness.

I had tried to struggle up to go in pursuit, but my maimed limbs refused to bear me, and I fell fainting across the bed as the nurse and doctor hurried into the room. As soon as I came to myself I cried out wildly, passionately, that I had been robbed, that I was ruined, that my position in life was lost !

The doctor looked at me with a smile.

" Don't make too sure of that," he said.

And taking something from his waistcoat pocket, he placed it on the palm of his hand and held it towards me.

It was the Rajah's diamond! For the first few moments rapture and relief left room for no other thoughts. But, then, I asked, in bewilderment, how it had happened; for I had been so certain that the diamond was on me. After the doctor had assured me of its safety, I had managed more than once to press my wounded arm against my side and had then felt, distinctly, the small, hard substance that was worth so much.

The doctor laughed.

"That was a substitute," he said; and then he explained that, seeing I was in such a weak, excited state, he had not thought it prudent to leave the diamond with me. At the same time, seeing I should fret myself into a fever at parting with it, he had compromised matters by taking the diamond from me while I slept, and putting something in its place to keep me quiet.

"I intended to put a small pebble," he said, " but in the hurry of the moment could not find one of the right size, so made use, instead, of a bit of coal, which was exactly what I wanted. So you see your friend from the East has gone off with a diamond of his own colour."

_________________

9: Eastern Guile

Leslie Beresford

1878-1946

Australian Women's Weekly 10 Jan 1942

IN the exhausting heat of the city police-thana at Lalpuri, Tempest had been listening with truly exemplary patience to the clamor of conflicting native tongues.

It was his duty as district superintendent to reach the root of the rioting which had been in fullblooded swing here a few hours earlier, he happening to be so conveniently on the spot. And, to all appearances, that root was exposed.

Before him stood Hurry Dass Bahadur, a wealthy landowner, and the highly-respected head of the Lalpuri City municipality, with disordered native clothes showing how he had been attacked.

The attacker, a lean and youngish Sikh. Rao Singh, had the hungry and snarling air of a pariah at bay. He had indeed even now to be restrained from attempts to reach the Bengali, three hefty policemen being needed to keep him in a tight hold.

Of all times Rao Singh had chosen to make his assault on the richest and most important citizen in Lalpuri during a Hindu sacred festival, with a strong Moslem element only awaiting an excuse to make a good day of it.

There had been a pretty to-do when the police, composed of both races, joined in with practical purpose, and it was to this truly colorful reception that Tempest, paying a special unheralded visit to Lalpuri, arrived.

Before him now, in the police than a pariah dog and wealthy land-owner appeared as origin of all the tumult. But so far he had made little of the reason behind it all.

Naturally, as the aggrived party and an important citizen, Hurry Dass Bahadur had secured by far most of Tempest's hearing. His sheeplike bleat, painfully protesting, had poured forth like a flood in accusing com-plaint.

At intervals he had been interrupted by the stubborn snarl of the Sikh, cynically arguing, scoffing excuses and demanding redress.

"Am I to starve, with my young wife and all my family, at the will of this old money-bags, this serpent, this thief of a Bengali?" he now shouted suddenly, livid with fury.

Tempest had been mentally noting the Sikh's squared shoulders, proud poise of turbaned head and athletic shape beneath drab peasant clothing. He had, as one could see. made mincemeat of the Bengali's over-fed flesh, and somehow Tempest could not conquer a feeling of amusement at this. He was curious to know what lay behind it all. and demanded of the Sikh:

"How comes it then that you and yours have cause to starve?"

Of course it was no new story the Sikh told. It was that of the mil-lions of poor in India— the millstone of the money-lender's debt.

Rao Singh, it transpired, had left the army on his father's death to take over the latter's small estate nearby. He had found this heavily mortgaged to Hurry Dass, who was proving merciless and had started to foreclose.

If Rao Singh was to be believed also, the reason for this was mainly one of personal spite. One gathered from his story that Hurry Dass coveted his young wife, and so was seeking to ruin him.

Tempest, listening patiently, disbelievingly, cut short the tirade eventually.

"Listen now to me, Rao Singh," he ordered. "None of this is my affair, which is to see that the public peace is kept. Not only have you caused grievous bodily harm to this zemindar, who also is a Bahadur and honored by the Raj, but througn this you have created great tur-moil in Lalpuri City. For this you must certainly be punished."

"If it please the Presence, I could say more about this same Bahadur—" Rao Singh was once again flinging his truculent voice into the heat-breathless room when Tempest silenced him sharply.

"Enough!" he commanded. "You have been in the army, you say?"

"I was sowar in the Punjab Cavalry, lord," the other answered proudly. "I have papers to prove from the colonel sahib there that I served the Raj well—"

"Then you are the more to blame, Rao Singh, that you serve the Raj so badly now by making this trouble!" Tempest stayed him. "As a soldier you should know that the peace must be kept.

"If indeed you have a right grievance against this Bahadur sahib, it is for you to seek justice In the proper way, which is not by the striking of blows. It is to the court you should go, laying your case before the magistrate and, if you have proof enough against the Bahadur, justice will surely be done!"

Tempest admittedly read the little curtain-lecture with his tongue in his cheek. He knew well enough that this advice was of small practical value to a man in Rao Singh's humble position, probably unable to afford litigation and likely enough without the slightest grounds for redress.

Hurry Dass, like most of his moneyed class, owed much of his wealth to just such mortgages as that of which the Sikh complained. Tempest guessed the law would not be very helpful to the latter in that case.

As for his suggestion of persecution for baser motives, the titled position of the Bengali, and his unquestionable public reputation, made this hardly the sort of accusation likely to cut ice with any magistrate, let alone be easy to prove.

The man was merely kicking against the pricks by suggesting it.

Hurry Dass himself, in fact, scoffed at the very idea in an aside with Tempest, while Rao Singh was being dragged to a cell by a strong escort— which indeed was needed, for there was muscle in his lean frame.

"Have I not wives of my own, Superintendent Sahib?" the Bengali smiled sardonically.

Tempest politely reassured him that the matter was not worth discussion. It was some time before he could shake off the obsequious friendliness and pressure of hospitality showered on him by Hurry Dass, obviously anxious that the district superintendent's unexpected arrival should not pass without fitting celebration.

"It is only the second occasion I have been privileged to meet you, sahib," he reminded, and urged: "At least you will surely pay a short visit to my poor house where, on this night of festival, I shall be entertaining some of my many friends?"

Tempest, with other ideas in his mind, explained that, much as he appreciated the invitation, this particular evening was impossible. Another time, perhaps...

He seized the first excuse to pass out from the stifling heat of the police-thana into the cool evening air of the festival-gay city, as he was anxious to pursue the real purpose behind his unheralded visit to Lalpuri.

With him, obviously much surprised by that visit, was his local chief-inspector, Da Cruz. A plump and middle-aged man of Portuguese and Indian blood, he had been here for some years.

He had reported to Tempest, when the latter took over the district not many months before, as an excellent man, with such good influence as to have been specially retained here.

Curiously, in Tempest's personal experience so far, some influence had certainly been at work in Lalpuri, and not for its good. Nor yet on the side of law and order, which Da Cruz and his police represented. It was of this Tempest now wasted no time in reminding the other in his quiet, dry way.

"Will not the Presence help me before it is too late?" the girl shyly entreated Temple.

"Having disposed of that little private squabble for the moment, supposing we get down to the real cause of the trouble," he suggested. "You and I know, Da Cruz, that to-day's upheaval can't all be blamed on that poor, foolish Rao Singh, though he'll certainly do time for it."

"And deservedly, slr!" The inspector smiled self-confidently. "By running amuck like that, anyhow, he was the cause producing the effect, if I may put it that way—"

"It would be an exaggeration, Da Cruz. Your effect was several sizes too big for your cause, to my way of thinking. Rao Singh was no more than a timely excuse, I'm sure. The fact, as you know well, is that public temperature in Lalpuri has been at fever-heat for some little time now. We've had here an epidemic of riotings on the least provocation, and a murder or two thrown in, without our having as yet discovered the people behind it all. Isn't that so?"

"With apologies, sir, if you please," the other retorted in his mincing English. "There can be no doubt it is the work of political agitators secretly stirring up strife on account of the European war and recent provincial government resignations of Congress members—"

"Just political dope, eh?"

Standing beside his waiting car. Tempest appeared to be gazing reflectively at the animated crowds of natives pushing their way into the nearby cinemas, or moving about in parties enjoying themselves in festival mood. Actually, in the little mirror catching rear traffic from his driver's seat, he was watching the reflection of his inspector's swarthy face.

"NO doubt at all about that, sir," Da Cruz assured. "Also I have been doing everything possible to discover their identities. Most kindly ask Hurry Dass Bahadur, who has been most kind and extremely helpful. Hurry Dass Bahadur, with so many irons in the fire, so many sources of information, sir— he will doubtless inform you of our insurmountable difficulties, should you so wish—"

"No need to trouble Hurry Dass, Inspector!" Tempest thrust ki dryly. "I haven't been so long in the police without knowing what the force can be up against-on occasions. But I also don't admit that any difficulties are insurmountable, if they are handled properly, and as I propose to handle them now I'm here.

"Incidentally," he went on, "I arrived last night, and am staying with Mr. Morgan at the jute mills. He's been experiencing quite a deal of trouble in those mills during the last few weeks, he tells me."

"Quite small troubles, sir. Also, I am sure, Mr. Morgan has told you that he received the fullest and most prompt assistance of the police?"

"What he did tell me, Inspector, was that he doesn't put those troubles down to just political dope, though there may be some of that around too. He argues on exactly the same lines as I do on the matter."

"Which lines, sir?" the other asked, his tone of voice suddenly sharp with anxiety.

"That those politician fellows usually only agitate. They've rarely got the nerve for murder, Da Cruz. No, Mr. Morgan feels, as I do, that it isn't only political agitation stuff. That may be the excuse under which others work."

"Others, sir?" Da Cruz questioned sharply.

"A real criminal gang. Inspector, with probably— we think, almost certainly— one ruling big brain behind them, cleverly masked, working with secrecy and an amazing smartness. Especially in one respect, Da Cruz. Dope. Not political, but purely chemical, if one may use the expression. Mr. Morgan says he has proofs that the traffic in drugs around here is alarming. Know anything about that, Da Cruz?"

Again Tempest consulted the little rear-traffic mirror on his car. He had a reflection of the furtive apprehension flitting momentarily over his inspector's face. He saw, too, how he controlled himself before saying: "If Mr. Morgan is so sure of that, sir, perhaps also he can prove from where the drugs came?"

"He just wishes he could. The people he tackled were too afraid to talk. That always has been one of the police difficulties you spoke about, Inspector. But surely you can't, in your position, be so com-pletely ignorant of what is going on?"

"Sir, in every part of India there is always a certain amount of drug traffic. As your honor knows—"

"My honor knows this!" Tempest stopped him tersely. "I'm comparatively new to this district, and it's the first time I've been superintendent anyhow. That doesn't mean, Da Cruz, I don't know my job, which is to see that Lalpuri is cleaned up of dope and troubler. As you don't seem able to do that yourself—"

Here he was in turn stopped by a sudden outbreak of excited shouting and much violent movement just in front of the police-thana. Swinging round, he saw a crowd of agitated natives swept this way and that by a rush of uniformed constables.

These were clearly in hot chase of a solitary fleet-footed figure racing like the wind across the little market-place, then suddenly vanishing in the dense throng beyond, where it was dark...

Back in the police-thana, a corpulent native sub-inspector explained in panic - stricken horror. While his men had been dealing with two bhang-intoxicated revellers brought in for brawling, one of the other prisoners had cleverly seized the opportunity to escape.

When Tempest learnt the culprit to be that firebrand ex-soldier, Rao Singh, he merely registered inward disappointment that so stout a fellow should have been fool enough to pile up punishment for himself on this second count. Mostly the incident added point to the hint he had just been giving his inspector. He emphasised this now afresh as he turned to him.

"You see, Da Cruz? You don't seem able even to hold your detained prisoners in safe custody!" he reprimanded scathingly, adding as he turned to go: "Let me be hearing soon that the man has been found and brought back, I shall be in Mr. Morgan's place at the jute mills for the rest of the evening."

Driving his car out of the city in the moonlight, Tempest felt a touch of impatience over the way this stupid fire-brand of a Sikh kept cropping up inconveniently, pushing himself and his puny affairs into the limelight, when far more vital matters were at issue.

Over dinner with Morgan, after relating the day's happenings, he said as much.

"I know that Rao Singh— by sight anyhow, which is about as far as one ever does know natives!" the other chuckled. "Actually, it's not long since he married the daughter of one of my foremen— rather a pretty little wench, when you could get a glimpse of her face. Their bit of land and house aren't far from here. And so— Rao Singh caused to-day's flare-up, eh?"

"He was at least the excuse." Tempest leaned forward, first glanc-ing round to make sure they were alone.

"I'm sorry to say so, Morgan," he went on. "I hate the idea of a police official going wrong, especially of inspector rank. But— I'm afraid your suspicions are right. Da Cruz most certainly is not on the square. I watched him when he didn't know it, and face and manner gave him away. My surprise visit had caught him unawares, anyhow, but when he gathered the mood I was in, and realised he was more or less on tile carpet, he couldn't hide the fact that he was in a mortal funk."

"Pity, perhaps, you showed your hand so much," Morgan suggested. "I know why you did, of course. It was giving the man a good sporting chance; and maybe you know your own business best. Still—" the mills manager shrugged, "I'm afraid you'll get no change out of Da Cruz. I only hope I haven't done wrong, writing you as I did."

"On the contrary, should I be here if I hadn't appreciated your warning?" Tempest sat for a while in brooding silence, and then went on: "That warning, in effect, is that Da Cruz is deep in the pocket of Hurry Dass Bahadur. And that gentleman, camouflaged by a title and a sterling reputation, is actually the secret brain behind the organisation at work here. It seems almost too fantastic to believe, Morgan."

"It certainly does, and you've only my word to back both suggestions. Certainly— if it came to a pinchthe first might easily enough be in-vestigated secretly and found right. As for Hurry Dass's Jekyll-and-Hyde career— that, as I told you, came to me in confidence from an old native merchant in the city. And he, curiously enough, died mysteriously the very next day."

"Suggesting almost that he was bumped off as suspected of having talked?"

"All I know is that the old chap's tongue was effectively silenced— anyhow, whether by accident or design. We— I should have said you, as the policeman— can only work on that hint."

"It seems incredible," Tempest mused. "The man's very standing cries out contradiction to such a thing. The ghastly risks he would be taking if the truth came out—"

"You can be sure he's watching that point, Tempest, making sure no doors are left open. That's the beauty of his combination with your man, don't you see? Those he doesn't chance to lock tight, your Da Cruz does."

"Artful devils— if it's true!" Tempest laughed again moodily. "Both of them, of course, the very last people in Lalpuri to be suspected. Not that there's any new gag in that."

He lapsed into thoughtful silence for a while, then added: "However, the problem is how to bust the show. Naturally, now I've let Da Cruz see I'm standing for no nonsense— and supposing he really is working in with Hurry Dass— they'll close up like oysters, shut down the works for the time being anyhow, and that's as far as I'll get."

"I'm afraid that's about it, Tempest; but even that will be something."

"But it's not everything. It's not what I want," Tempest fretted. "It would be too much like hatching an addled egg. This is my first district, and— as you can guess— all my future career in the police depends on how I handle my charge. Think what it would mean to me if I could only catch those two red-handed, with every possible proof to hang them, the whole sinister business un-masked, if it does exist."

"Purely a question of patience, old son."

"Patience? My dear Morgan, the inspector-general isn't overburdened with that virtue, believe me! Did I tell you last night that— just before getting your letter—I had a sharp memorandum from him about the state of affairs here, and what was I doing about it? You see—"

Tempest saw that Morgan was gesturing warning across the table. Turning, the reason became apparent in a native butler salaaming. The man explained that two men and a young woman had asked to see the manager sahib most urgently.

Morgan, with an apology to Tempest, followed his servant out on to the broad, moonlit verandah beyond the open dining-room windows. A moment later, however, his voice called Tempest sharply, and the latter joined him.

"It's about that troublesome friend of yours, Rao Singh!" the mills manager told him. "This is his wife, with her father and brother. They seem to be in a devil of a state about him jumping gaol and now asking for more trouble, or something. Just what, I don't know, but Hurry Dass seems mixed up in it, so I thought you'd best solve the problem yourself."

The slim figure of a young girl moved agitatedly with a jangle of silver jewellery on arms and ankles. Tempest could see— as the colored sari over hair and mouth slipped accidentally for a moment, showing her face clearly, her fine and frightened eyes, the almost startling fairness of her skin— that she was really lovely.

One of her male companions began to explain to him. The Presence would know how Rao Singh had escaped from the thana, for it was known the Presence himself had sent him there.

Rao Singh was foolish, filled with a great madness and an enmity against Hurry Bass Bahadur sahib. Even now, they feared, he meant to kill the Bahadur this night. Had he not returned home, after escaping from gaol, and then gone again quickly, taking a knife with him?

"Will not the Presence help me before it is too late, that my husband may not do this evil thing?" thrust in pleadingly the shyly des-perate voice of the young girl. "Truly, the Bahadur means evil td him and me, yet I would rather that evil than it should happen to my lord that he kills a man!"

"And what can I do to prevent it?" Tempest asked with some natural impatience, having more to trouble him that this madman's behaviour. "How comes it that my police have not already taken him?" he demanded, irritated at that delay, too.

Getting no answer from them he turned to Morgan. "I don't suppose for a moment there's anything in it," he said in undertones, "but— to be quite candid— I feel it would be a pity if that headstrong idiot of a Rao Singh went to the hangman for a fellow like our Bahadur. I think I'd better go over to his place anyhow, in case."

"If I may, I'll go with you," the other suggested, and-Tempest agreeing-he turned and advised the natives to go home, saying that they must hope for the best.

The large and rambling house of Hurry Dass was. in fact, no distance away. The lights from its interior could be seen among the trees across the vast expanse of green grass maidan between the city and the broad flowing river.

"Matter of fact." Tempest reminded himself suddenly as they neared the place. "Hurry Dass did invite me to look in to-night, saying he was celebrating the festival with a party. That would be a good opportunity for a fellow running amuck like this Rao Singh to get in and do his worst."

GRIMLY Tempest added: "In any case, the fact that the chap is still at large is another nail in Da Cruz's coffin. He ought to have had him back in the police-thana hours ago if he'd been anything of a chief inspector. He's certainly not looking after his job—"

"You're a bit wrong in your judgment there, old son!" Morgan interrupted, stopping suddenly and drawing Tempest's attention to what could be seen inside a room of the house through lighted windows a few feet from where they stood.

There was the uniformed figure of Da Cruz, together with Hurry Dass and a crowd of other natives in a great state of excitement. The reason for this, Tempest saw, too, was Rao Singh, struggling furiously in the hold of several constables, one of whom was in the act of wresting from his right hand a knife with a long and gleaming blade.

"The fellow's certainly a fighter, even if he's all sorts of fools," Tempest had to admit admiringly.

Followed by Morgan, he was quickly indoors, not waiting to be announced. Nor was his presence noticed— until he had thrust through the throng of chattering natives, and had come face to face with the still struggling Sikh.

At sight of him the latter became suddenly still, and then— to Tempest's surprise— showed his ivory white teeth in a broad grin.

"Salaam, sahib," he greeted in that fierce, stubborn voice of his. "Now am I no longer afraid, seeing that the Presence is here! Now, indeed, shall I have justice—"

Whatever he had further to say was silenced by the stranglehold of the police, and meantime Hurry Dass was hurriedly taking Tempest's attention.

"You are indeed welcome, Superintendent Sahib, graciously honoring my poor house after all. How fortunate that you arrive also at this very moment! You see how the good Da Cruz has caught this escaped prisoner so cleverly, finding him concealed here with evil purpose—"

"A matter of the most simple deduction, sir." Da Cruz preened himself with smiling self-satisfaction. "It was easy to guess that he might be expected to find his way here, having a grievance against the Bahadur, so I came along with some men. Sure enough, presently there was an alarm raised upstairs by a servant, and my men found him."

"I must tell you, sahib, that this madman has committed an unfor-givable sin!" Hurry Dass interposed. "He seems to have been hiding in the purdah apartments where my wives usually are kept, and which— as your honor knows— no man but myself may enter, according to our native law. Fortunately, as it happens, my wives and their women had been sent to the hills last week, so the apartments were empty."

"Well, in which case, Bahadur, the unforgivable sin did very little real harm," Tempest could not resist saying dryly, and— less interested in this crime against custom than in the Sikh, if only for sympathetic reasons— he turned to the latter.

"The advice I gave you in the police-thana seems to have fallen on deaf ears, Rao Singh," he rebuked sternly. "Did I not warn you that justice was not obtained by the striking of blows and a breaking of the peace? How much less now that you came here even to kill?"

"To kill?" The other shook his head, and asked: "Why should the Presence think that?"

"Why else did you go to your home, taking from there, as you know you did, the knife I have myself seen plucked from your hand?"

The Sikh's finely cut lips broadened in a grin once again. He flung back his turbaned head with pride.

"Not to kill this fat pig of a Bengali did I carry that knife, my lord," he assured firmly. "Only to defend myself if— as happened— I was caught before I had done that for which I came, that for which I purposely made my way into the women's part of this house-"

"Arrah— what is it he says?" Hurry Dass butted in with his bleat on a note of amazement and some obvious anxiety, then addressed Tempest: "Why waste time, honored sahib, listening to this mad dog? Let Da Cruz and the police take him away to the thana where he will be safe, and our enjoyment may once more proceed on this festival night—"

"All in good time, Bahadur," Tempest checked the other.

Something in the Sikh's burning eyes, an obvious message of frantic mute appeal, intrigued him. He had little enough confidence in Hurry Dass, anyhow.

"I think we'll first of all make sure what really did bring this Rao Singh here, and into your women's apartments— of all places," he insisted, and asked the Sikh to explain.

"Did not the Presence say in the police-thana that, if I would have justice from the Sirkar against this Bengali, I must have proof for the magistrate sahib?" Rao Singh reminded. "It was for that I came here. What I had been told, I had indeed heard. Yet, in the eyes of the Sirkar, telling and hearing are nothing. Therefore I sought here the proof, that I might show it to the Presence—"

"Proof of what?" Tempest demanded, puzzled, and strained of patience.

"That which I will show the Presence if he will so order that I go with him to those women's quarters. True, no women are there, as I knew when I went. But much is there which the Bengali seeks to be kept even more hidden than his wives—"

Tempest and Morgan both had violently to intervene, so startling and unexpected was the reaction produced by the Sikh's unfinished sentence. For Hurry Dass, livid of face and completely beside himself, had leaped at his throat, screaming in mad fury, bleating no longer. Only force eventually dragged him away.

And now, as Tempest looked at Da Cruz's fear-stricken eyes and twitching, swarthy face, he realised that an almost incredible hope was emerging into possible and miraculous certainty.

"Since there are no women in those rooms, Bahadur," he said tersely, "you will allow me to see for myself what this Sikh is talking about."

WAITING for no answer, he ordered the police to unhand Rao Singh and follow him. The Sikh stalked into a great hall, up a stairway, along passages and then into the first of several rooms, empty save for Oriental furnishings. In one of these the party came to a halt.

"It was my wife who whispered to me of this, sahib," Rao Singh explained to Tempest with the air of a showman. "It was her custom to visit a woman friend here before we were married, and thus she came to know accidentally of the secret. Yet, as the Presence said to-day, of what use that secret if I could not prove it?

"For that reason, Protector of the Poor," he went on, "I escaped from the police and made my way here to-night, that I might take in my hand some of this proof and bring it to the Presence. But they found me too quickly. Therefore, when I saw the sahib, I said to him that now I had no fear. For now—"

Striding to a corner and pushing aside a divan, he opened up some loose floorboards till a dark gap appeared, with wooden steps leading downwards...

A COUPLE OF HOURS later Tempest was back at Morgan's place, delightedly contemplating the wholly unforeseen results of a hectic day.

"What a veritable Chu-Chin-Chow hide-up," he said laughingly. "Dope— stacks of it! Jewellery and money galore. And what more perfect stowaway than the purdah apartments of his wives, safe from any outsider's intrusion, even from police-search without a very special warrant?"

"And with Da Cruz in his pocket to make sure that never came off!" chuckled Morgan. "Well, that's put paid both to him and our Hurry Dass Bahadur, besides getting you well into the limelight with your inspector-general, who isn't too patient."

"All through a poor, ignorant Sikh running amuck," Tempest acknowledged not ungratefully, and added: "Not perhaps so poor and ignorant after all, for he might make a first class policeman, as I've been suggesting to him. It would be poetic justice if Da Cruz and our Bahadur come out, after the very considerable sentences they'll get, to find Rao Singh bossing it over them as chief inspector here. I ll see he gets the chance, anyhow."

____________________

10: Aurora's Treasure

Lady Gilbert

(Rosa Mulholland, 1841-1921)

World's News (Sydney) 15 Sep 1917

SHE was certainly a provokingly romantic girl, and the worst of it was (thought Aunt Jane) that she was proud of her absurd peculiarity. It had been urged on her from her babyhood that she belonged to a family remarkable for, common-sense, and she was expected to live up to her antecedents and belongings, yet the result had been that Aurora had found all her surroundings flat and stale, and had refused homage to the idol of matter-of-fact set up for her to worship. She held to her own ideal, hated common-sense, and adored the wilfulness of the sea and the wild winds, not noisily or rebelliously, it is true, but only just with that sweet, dreamy, irresistible look in her beautiful eyes which was the admiration, of her lovers and the despair of the solicitous relative who had charge of her.

Aunt Jane had several theories with regard to this awkward feature in the girl's character. One was that the silly name of Aurora bestowed on her by a mother of idealistic tastes had influenced her fancy, and even her appearance, notwithstanding that the family name of Jane had been tacked on to it as a sort of brake or make-weight. Even when severely addressed as Aurora Jane she remained Aurora, with the color of the sunrise in her hair, and the clear blue and the sea-shell tints of the early morning in her eyes and cheeks and lips.

Aunt Jane was the widowed mother of several daughters, all of whom she had successfully disposed of here and there about the world, and only that the charge of Aurora had developed upon her she would have found herself without an occupation. With all its cares and drawbacks it was a pleasant charge, for Aurora was a well-dowered little maid, owner of a pretty estate and home on the coast of Cornwall, very affectionate, and found quite sufficiently docile and tractable by her aunt on all but certain extraordinary matters.

One of the difficult matters was that of "settling herself" in life, as it was put to her. The good lady was rather disinterested in her zeal to hurry the child, for the Cornish home was a pleasant harbor, but when had selfishness ever been allowed to interfere with Aunt Jane's devotion to duty?

Daring her first visit to gay London friends Aurora had refused several perfectly suitable proposals of marriage, and, though severely lectured by her aunt, remained unrepentant.

"Having placed my own daughters happily in the world," said Aunt Jane, tragically, "am I to be left with you as an old maid on my hands?"

"No woman is an old maid till she is twenty-two," protested Aurora, "and I am still four years within the limit. Besides, there are no old maids in the world now, as I have learned, only single women who are too wise to buy or sell themselves into slavery, and who choose to live their own lives according to their own ideals."

"Fiddlesticks!" said Aunt Jane, rattling her knitting needles. "Have not men got ideals also?"

"They talk only about stocks and law cases, and financing, and big business contracts,'' said Aurora gleefully. "When I meet with one who has noble and lofty thoughts and aspirations I will marry him."

"If he will have you," said Aunt Jane. "By that time, however, you complexion and figure wlll both be gone, and nobody will want you."

"Delightful!" said Aurora, clapping her hands, "for I shall then be as free as— the sea-birds!"

It was at this time that Aurora found her treasure, a discovery which proved to her that there existed somewhere in the world a man of the most lofty aspirations and ideals. One day, when she was as usual roaming about the sea-shore, diving in and out of coves, and climbing up and down cliffs, envying the puffins and penguins and thoroughly enjoying her liberty as far as it went, she noticed a brown lump half buried in the seaweed on the side of a low rock left bare by the ebbing tide. At first she thought it was a lump of sea-rack, but on stirring it with her foot found it hard, and that in fact it was a book bound in solid brown leather and fastened with a lock from which hung attached a very tiny key. She shook it from its wet surroundings, and dried it as much as possible with her pocket-handkerchief. Then she sat in the sun on the beach and opened the book with the key and proceeded to examine its contents.

It proved to be a manuscript book, all written in a delicate, though strong masculine hand, quite legible, if a little injured by wetting. Dipping into its contents Aurora soon found that she had come in contact with a noble ideal mind, loftier in thought and aspiration than even her imagination had ever conceived of. She carried it home and enshrined it in her maiden chamber, where she read it and re-read it from day to day till the unknown writer became a sort of spirit companion to her, and his exalted utterances were accepted as the perfect expression of her own hitherto unformulated ideals. No name was to be found within the book, only the initials G.N., for which she invented many a continuation of Christian name and surname. She acknowledged to herself that it was very unlikely she should ever meet with the real G.N., the owner of the book. To have advertised for him would have spoiled the romance of the whole thing. So she contented herself with making a vow that in case she ever met him she would marry him. In the more  probable event of her never happening to meet him she would remain to the end of her life in her sea-girt home, as free and as happy as the winds and her companions the sea-birds.

Aunt Jane, of course, was unaware of the existence of Aurora's treasure trove, and the romance she had woven round it. Several months went past, and the girl had studied the marvellous book from cover to cover, sometimes in her own room, sometimes sitting on the rocks above the tumbling waves, wrapped in delight at the eloquent revelations of an exalted mind which were made to her through its pages. Gradually her fancy penned an image of the author of these writings, and the unknown owner of the precious book became a sort of spiritual companion to her in her lonely way of life, a refuge from the prosaic preachments of the excellent but untactful Aunt Jane. At first she thought of him only as a spirit, one lost at sea, his book but a part of the wreckage of some vessel that had foundered, but later on she bethought her that as the book was not absolutely saturated to ruin by the sea water, it might have been dropped on the shore by a wayfarer along the beach, who might yet be alive in the world, and to be met with.

While living in her dream she found herself obliged to pay one of those visits to distant relatives whose example in matters of commonly sense was looked to by her anxious aunt as a possible moans for her salvation. And so, provided with plenty of pretty frocks and other matters suitable to her age and condition, she departed for Bilberry Park, the precious book packed away at the very bottom of the stoutest of her well-strapped and carefully locked travelling trunks, reserved there as a solace for probably weary days when she might be feeling tired of uncongenial company and longing for liberty and the sea-birds.

Lady Bilberry was her cousin, the eldest and most sensible of Aunt Jane's well brought up and well "settled" daughters, whose husband was a worthy retired brewer who had become a magnate in his county. She had assembled a few pleasant people to meet her young cousin, of whom she was really fond, though looking on her rather as a sentimental little idiot.

Several agreeable and more or less eligible men were of the party, and on the first evening Aurora was taken in to dinner by a shrewd-looking, elderly personage, who was introduced as Sir Gregory Nicholls to the young lady from Cornwall. The name gave her a little shock as bearing the magic initials, but on her other hand sat an attractive young barrister, whose name she discovered was Mr. Geoffry Norman. Both were exceedingly attentive to Aurora, who was indeed looking most charming, with the color of the sea breezes in her checks and a light of unusual excitement in her eyes.

"G.N." she was thinking. "Both of these are G.N.s. Is the world full of them? But they cannot all have lost my precious book. Sir Gregory couldn't. He is too old for high ideals. And lawyers are too matter-of-fact. It cannot be that I am bound to marry one of these men!" One minute her blood ran cold at the thought, the next her heart was beating wildly. "Oh," she reflected, "let me try not to be as foolish as Aunt Jane thinks me!"

She plucked up her spirits, and a few weeks passed of gaieties in contrast to the quietude of Aurora's life at home. She enjoyed herself extremely, and there were no weary days when she was obliged to seek companionship from the book that lay buried and forgotten at the very bottom of her trunk.

The fact was that she had begun to live under the overwhelming spell of Geoffrey Norman's delightful personality, aware that he had fallen in love with her at the first moment of their meeting, and having made up her mind that, even if, he were a matter-of-fact lawyer, he was the only creature in the world for whose sake she could clip her wings and set her feet on the ordinary highways of life.

Out of a new and astonishingly happy dream she was awakened with a shock. Sir Gregory Nicholls was talking to Lady Bilberry about Cornwall.

"Cornwall!" the gentleman was saying. "I agree with you. It is a charming spot. And yet I confess that I owe it a grudge. About a year ago I lost on the beach there one of the most valuable things I have ever possessed—"

"Not your heart, I hope, Sir Gregory," said the lady sweetly.

"Oh no, oh no! That loss was reserved as an experience for Bilberry Park,"' said the old gentleman testily, with an expressive glance at Aurora, who was sitting at some distance absorbed in her own pleasant reflections.

"It was, in fact, a manuscript book, written in my own hand when I was young. It was full of the most beautiful sentiments, not perhaps so fashionable nowadays, but of perennial worth— an irreparable loss—"

"Did you advertise for it?' said Lady Bilberry. "I should have done so and offered a reward."

"No," said Sir Gregory. "I felt sure it had been carried out to sea, as no doubt it was, for the tides are high round that coast.'

Aurora, listening, sat pale and stunned, feeling that an awful doom had overtaken her. When able to collect her thoughts and move, she got up and escaped to the garden, where she sat alone in a little bower in a distant nook and wept. Only the day before Sir Gregory had made her a proposal of marriage, which she had refused with a light heart and never a thought of the book that lay at the bottom of her trunk. And now, here she was face to face with her terrible vow, and overtaken by unspeakable disaster!

"Oh, you are in trouble!" said a sympathetic voice, and she looked up to see Geoffry Nor-man standing beside her. "Can I help you.

"No; nobody can help me!" moaned Aurora.

"Try me. Trust me!" pleaded Geoffry ur-gently.

"Oh, I can't say it!" cried Aurora in despair. "And yet I must tell someone. It's just this. I have been horribly foolish. But I won't marry Sir Gregory Nicholls, though I've got to do it."

"Who can compel you?" said Geoffry indignantly. "Who is trying to terrify you?"

"Nobody. Only my vow—" said Aurora, trying to stop her sobs, but sobbing all the more for the effort.

Then it all came out— Aurora's romantic story of her folly, and Geoffry's outpouring of the most tender devotion.

"Such a vow is not binding in law," he assured her.

"But is it not binding in conscience?" said Aurora.

"Nor in conscience either," said the young lawyer in the most decided manner. "Let me see this extraordinary book."

Aurora brought it, holding the once-prized volume aloof from her, and looking at it with disgust.

"H'm!" said Geoffry, turning it over from cover to cover. "This is not original stuff at all. It is a collection of extracts from standard authors, most of them much in vogue in the days when Sir Gregory was young."

"Oh, the imposter!" cried Aurora. "I do not think so. You see he makes no claim to authorship. Now, tell me, did you vow to marry all the authors of all these fine sentiments (many of whom are dead), or only the owner of the book, in the event of his being found?"

Aurora reflected. "Oh," she said, "I believe I said I would marry the owner, imagining he must, of course, be the author also."

"No matter what you imagined. It is evident it was the owner that you intended to marry."

"It was," said Aurora with a fresh burst of weeping. "But I can't do it. Oh, what will become of me?"

"Just leave the matter to me," said Geoffry. "Let me look at the book, and I will see If I can't find a way out of the difficulty."

that evening, when the young barrister was having a quiet half-hour with Sir Gregory in the smoke-room, he said:—

"By the way, I think I have got a piece of property of yours, which has come to my hands accidentally— a manuscript book picked up on a Cornish beach by a friend of mine. I hear you have lost such a thing, and I am anxious to restore it to you."

"Nonsense!" said Sir Gregory. "Well, we have heard that the world is so small! I never thought to see the thing again— a relic of the days when books were not so easily bought, and we made extracts—"

"I have been looking through it," said Geoffry, "and I am greatly struck by the peculiar excellence of your choice. I am a busy lawyer, and have not time to read largely on such ideal lines, and yet passages such as you selected would be very useful, to me on occasions. I wonder if I might dare without offence to ask you to let me purchase it from you."

"My dear fellow!" said Sir Gregory, "you flatter me immensely. I shall be delighted to make you a present of the book. I have lived my life since the days when the ideals of others were of service, to me. I had made up my mind that the thing was lost, and to tell the truth I have no great desire ever to see it again—"

"I am deeply grateful to you," said Geoffry. "You have no idea how I shall prize this present. I will ask you just to look at it long enough to write my name in the book— as a gift from yourself. Curiously enough, our initials are the same, but I should like to see 'Geoffry Norman, from the compiler, Sir Gregory Nicholls.' "

"Certainly, my dear boy, certainly!" said Sir Gregory, and the book was produced, and a few strokes of the pen made the work of the elder man the property of the younger.

Geoffry hastened away with his new possession, and found Aurora in the garden.

"Your conscience is saved," he said. "I can assure you that the book no longer belongs to Sir Gregory Nicholls."

Aurora shook her head. "I heard him say that he lost it, also that he valued it immensely."

"Nevertheless he has given it away, and it is mine!"

Aurora looked within the cover of the book, and her cheeks turned the color of the roses beside her.

"You vowed to marry the owner of the volume," said Geoffry. "You shall not be bound by that vow unless you love me. Shall I tear it up, Aurora?"

"Oh no, no!" cried Aurora, stretching out both hands. "It is more precious than ever to me now. Give it to me."

It fell between them.

Aurora's hands had been seized and held; and the book lay on the grass forgotten.

THE NEWS was broken gently to Aunt Jane by Lady Bilberry. "After all," wrote the lady, "though Aurora might have done better,

it must be admitted that such a romantic little fool might easily have done worse. Dear Old Sir Gregory bears it good-humoredly, says she was right to prefer a young man to an old one, and has nothing but praises for Geoffry, whom he considers an astute lawyer and a man of unusual literary taste. How he discovered it all I don't know, but men soon come to know each other.

"As to his chances of the Woolsack I am not a judge, but from my observation and experience I can assure you that the young man is good looking and amiable, and has a sensible way with him, which ought to have a good effect upon Aurora. There is no doubt he is genuinely in love with her, nonsense and all, and though I do not believe he knew anything about her fortune before he proposed to her, still it will be very useful to the young pair, as the law is such an uphill profession."

____________________

11: The Dancer's Mascot

Beatrice Heron-Maxwell

1859-1927

World's News (Sydney) 8 Dec 1923

THE Brevity music-hall was having a success at last.

Several preceding revues had come down more or less with a run— or without one— and the reason why "Life and Its Livers" had ''clicked" was said to be Sylva White's dancing, which captivated the audience on the first night, and had continued to draw ever since.

There are born dancers, and dancers who are made by training, and others.

Sylva's talent was innate, and brought to perfection by careful teaching. She had the indescribable grace of a flower swaying in the breeze, or a bird skimming through the air; she was as light as thistledown on her feet, and as supple as a nautch girl. And every movement of her beautiful arms, every pose of her lissome figure, was a verse of the living poem she created when she danced.

Night after night the Brevity was packed for her turn, and the management had already given her a contract that meant the top of the tree for her, and a long run for their show.

On a June evening, when a crescent moon was sailing in a starry sky, and romance was in the air, even of a London street, the house, which had been half-empty, filled up just before nine for the "Fireflies"— the five girls of whom Sylva was the lead.

In the orchestra a young violinist with grave, dark eyes, and a handsome, pale face, gazed steadily at the O.P. side, by which the Queen of the Fireflies would enter.

It had happened that Max Delarme met Sylva and played for her to dance before she was engaged on a trial week at the Brevity; and the whole of his emotional artist's heart had yielded to the idyllic talent and the radiant personality of her. More than once he had tried, in those poor days of the little dancing girl, to tell her what she was to him. But Sylva, with all her joie-de-vivre, was not for love or lovers as yet.

She put him off with gay evasion; only now and again vouchsafing a special simile or glance just to keep him from despair.

Lately, since her success, he had looked for this reassurance in vain: and to the pain of hopelessness was added now the corroding flame of jealousy.

It was an ecstasy of agony that he suffered each night while he played first fiddle for her solo.

As the four girls who were her accessories crossed the stage and finished their prelude to her entrance. Max, keenly conscious of every detail, noted the expression on the face of one of them, a brunette called Julia Joy.

There was no mistaking the furious hate that disfigured it as Sylva entered and hovered in the centre before commencing a pas seul, while the storm of applause greeted her, the music purposely dallying under the conductor's baton to give her time and mark her as the star.

Then Sylva, with a little gesture of both hands, as though she would gather the incense of adulation to her heart, glanced at the conductor and broke into her swallow-flight.

Max, watching closely, saw her reach the corner where Julia Joy was, saw Julia take a half-step forward from the line, and thereby collide with Sylva just as she made her swift turn to dart up the stage again.

It was very nearly a bad fiasco.

Sylva, all unconscious of the cause, was thrown off her balance, and would have fallen headlong but for her consummate skill and elasticity.

As it was, she only touched the ground with her finger-tips, and was upright and whirling on before the audience fully realised the clever recovery.

But when they did the applause burst out in a tornado of approval, and the slip that might have meant a failure became a fresh triumph.

A man leaning out of a box led the clapping that greeted her concluding pose, and Sylva, glancing directly at him, smiled her recognition. Julia's eyes were malignant as she looked from one to the other, and she was the embodiment of venomous spite when a superb trophy of white flowers was handed over the footlights, followed by bouquets and posies in profusion.

Sylva received the tribute with another upward glance at the box where Carew Blane sat.

Max, heedless of possible reprimand, as he ceased playing, flung a spray of lilies towards her.

She set her foot on it as she bowed in response to repeated calls, and the curtain went down on the picture that she made— branded indelibly on Max Delorme's brain— his flowers crushed and trampled, while a bloom from his rival's offering was raised to her lips, and her face glowed with emotion that was the counterfeit of love, if not love itself.

When Sylva reached her dressing-room she ran to the table where stood a small Oriental dancing figure, and, lifting it, kissed it and put some flowers round it.

"You think it is your mascot," said sneering voice behind her, and Sylva,  startled, faced round to find Julia Joy in the door way.

"I love my little Eastern girl," Sylva said quietly. "I always give her some of my flowers, and to-night she deserves them more than usual."

"Yes— more than you think. It was touch and go with you when you barged up against me."

Julia's voice was fiercely rancorous, and Sylva, wondering and a little dismayed, went and touched her on the shoulder.

"Why, Julie," she said, "was it you? How did it happen, dear? I was doing exactly the same as usual, and I always calculate that corner to a hair's breadth."

Then, seeing the anger in the girl's dark flush, she caught up one of her bouquets. "Don't let us quarrel over it," she added sweetly; "have some of my flowers."

Julia seized the posy and hurled it to the floor.

"I hate you," she stammered furiously. "I stepped forward on purpose. I hoped you would come to grief. I'll never dance with you again. I'm giving in my notice tonight."

And, as Sylva stepped back amazed, she ran to the table, snatched the little statuette, and threw it violently down, breaking it to pieces.

As she flung out of the room. Sylva knelt amongst the debris." trying to fit the broken fragments together, with tears shimmering in her eyes. The dresser, entering with a note, stared aghast.

"Why, whatever's happened to your little bit o luck, miss," she said. "Never mind about them pieces—"I'll pick 'em up for you. Read your letter, dear, and dry your eyes."

Sylva obeyed, and. changing her dress, pinned some of Blane's stephanotis in the front of it before she threw a cloak round her and sped along to the stage door.

Outside a grey limousine was waiting, and Blane met her as she emerged.

Max Delorme. waiting too. was about to speak to her, but she took Blane's arm and they got into the car and drove away.

One of her flowers had fallen. Max picked it up and put it reverently into his pocket.

The tragic despair in his soul deepened as he walked away; he was beginning to realise how completely Sylva had passed out of his life. He would have recognised it still more fully if his eyes could have followed his thoughts in pursuit of the car.

Blane, after capturing both Sylva's hands, had lifted them to his neck, and, clasping his arms round her, kissed her fervently.

Then, drawing a jewel-case from his pocket, he showed her the necklace that it held.

"Pearls for my pearl," he said, "as white as her sweet neck," and he kissed her again as he fastened the clasp.

"Oh, Carew! For me, really?" Sylva said. "Why should you give me such a lovely present?"

"Because I love you," he declared passionately, "my white rose of the world. Because I am going to give you everything you want, if you'll let me."

It seemed to be the fulfilment of all her dreams— a rich, adoring husband, the crown of her career!

They had reached the Supper Club, and were descending the stairs to the large room, when Sylva's foot slipped— the chance of an uneven edge to the carpet— and she fell to the landing below.

She gave a little sharp cry of pain, and Blane was beside her instantly, lifting her up and saying: "Not hurt. I hope?"

"Oh, no!" Sylva smiled. "It jarred my ankle, that's all. I'm quite all right."

Yet the color had left her cheeks and even her lips were pale, as she stood up and essayed to walk.

"I'm afraid I've wrenched it," she said faintly. "It doesn't seem to work properly. Oh. how stupid of me! I'm sure I can limp along to our table."

But every movewient was torture, and she turned faint with the pain.

Blane's expression was a curious blend ot concern and impatience.

He hated being made to look a fool, and the couples hastening to and from the supper room were beginning to notice the little episode.

Two girls whom he knew and who were non-attended, looked back over their shoulders at him and made a gesture of invitation as they hurried on.

"Perhaps there is more damage than you think," he suggested to Sylva. "Wouldn't it be wiser to see a doctor?"

"Yes. I suppose so." She was almost crying. "Do you mind taking me home. Carew?"

"Of course," he answered readily enough. "Lean on me and we'll get along at once."

His car took them to her flat, and he carried her in and directed her maid to telephone for his doctor.

"It's better when I rest." Sylva said, trying to keep up bravely. "Perhaps it's only a sprain, and It he binds it up very tight I could still go to supper with you."

Carew held his peace, except for a muttered remark about bad luck.

He did not care to have his evening spoilt, and the laughing grimaces of the two girls clung to his mind unpleasingly.

When, the doctor had examined the ankle he shook his head. "A compound fracture! What a pity you didn't stay where you were. I could have prevented that."

He busied himself with splints and bandages while Blane, pacing up and down In the passage, looked at his watch continually and swore softly under his breath.

Presently, when the doctor came out, he asked: "Not a serious injury, I suppose?"

"Very serious for her," the doctor answered. "She won't be able to dance for a long time— perhaps never again."

Blane made a hasty movement of dissatisfaction.

"Well, it's very unfortunate," he said, "but it can't be helped. I have to keep an appointment and am late already. Can I drop you, doctor."

Renee, Sylva's French maid, listening to them, turned to Sylva.

"Oh! pauvre madame, monsieur le docteur say that you may per'aps never dance any more."

Sylva stared at her for a moment in silence, scarcely able to realise the stupendous calamity that had befallen her; then, as the front door slammed after the two men, she fainted.

At the Supper Club, Blane, making his way to the table he had booked, was beckoned by the girls who had signalled to him before.

They had been joined by Lord Theophllus Hafton. known as "Toffy," and they called out as Blane approached, "Make a fourth. We want squaring here."

Blane agreed, and dismissed Sylva and the whole untoward incident from his mind.

A life of deliberate resolute pleasure had dulled his capacity for even ordinary sympathy; and chivalry had always been a dead letter to him.

He disliked bother, and was bored by misfortune; poverty and bad luck were crimes in his eyes, and he had no use for anyone or anything that fell short of success. Sylva's brief day with him was over.

Meanwhile Delorme in his Soho bedroom, was writing letters, the flower he had picked up outside the stage door, set in a glass of water, beside him.

We used to be good friends, Sylva, before you made your hit. Now you never look my way, and to-night you crushed my lilies beneath your feet. I care for you too deeply to continue playing while you dance. I see that I have lost you for ever, and can be nothing to you now. Yet, I wish you every possible happiness and a brilliant career. I go to America this week, and shall start a new life there.

Yours as ever,

Max Delorme.

P.S.—If you should need a friend— which is not likely— you have only to let me know. I would cgme to you from the end of the world.

He addressed the note to Sylva at the Brevity Theatre, and it remained there in the rack for many a day to come, being joined later on by one addressed to Max Delorme, in Sylva's writing.

Evil days had come to her following on the doctor's verdict. Her contract cancelled, her power of making money by her art gone for an indeftnite period, and the complete desertion of Carew Blane, had crushed her life as a flower is wilted by a thunder storm.

She had no near relations, and the crowd of pseudo-friends who had been so keen to be on good terms with the star of the moment had forgotten her before the week was out.

"Poor Sylvia White!" they ramarked to each other; "wasn't she broken up in some way? One never sees her now."

A brief epitaph, due more to carelessness than callousness!

Sylva herself had found time to do many kind things during her own days of struggle and work; but in the race for success and pleasure there Is little room for memory.

Lonely, and growing poorer every day as her stock of earnings evaporated, she despaired, until a gleam of hope came with the recollection of Max

She wrote a few lines, with confident expectation.

Dear Max

You once said that no matter what happened, you would never change to me. You must have heard of my accident, and that I may never be able to dance again professionally. I am very miserable and lonely. No one has been near me all this time. Won't you come?

Sylva.

Her letter joined the one addressed to her at the Brevity from Max. and both waited there with "No address left," pencilled on them.

It was on the day that she moved tram her flat to a cheap lodging that she passed a poster, headed "Brevity Theatre," showing Julia Joy in her new dance-seena.

Tears flashed into her eyes, and she drew back in the taxi, while an open car passed slowly by, the man and girl in it absorbed in looking at the poster.

It was Carew Kane and Julia, the brown eyes sparkling, the full, vivid lips smiling, and round her neck the pearls that Sylva, in her hurt pride, had returned long since to Kane. It was the last straw to Sylva's burden of unhappiness.

During the weeks that followed, she slid down hill faster and faster towards the valley of despondency.

Her money at an end, her htoalth broken, she lay. alter a bout of rheumatic fever, spent and exhausted.

Only the charity of her landlady stood between her and the workhouse.

Visions came to her of Max— Max in a concert-hall, playing to an enraptured audience, Max besieged by managers— Max signing a contract— Max opening a letter— hers!— Max turning from it to tear up the contract deed, and tendering bills for two thousand dollars in default.

Finally Max homeward bound on an ocean liner, with his face towards England and her! Delicious fancies, or the telepathic knowledge that is theirs who hover on the great borderland?

Her ragged curtain floating out from the open window over the dingy street below seemed to someone passing by, i* eager, search, to be a flag of distress and surrender.

He halted, drew a violin from under his arm, and began to play— the old melody to which Sylva danced on the fatal night.

Her wandering thoughts concentrated themselves, her restless fingers plucking the coverlet were still— she listened intently.

Presently she raised herself, stepped to the floor, and staggered with feeble steps toward the window.

On the narrow mantelpiece, the little Oriental figure, mended and patched, seemed to pause in its dance and watch her with soft, expectant eyes.

Sylva's feet began to move to the well-remembered measure: it was the wraith of her former self that danced towards death. As she felt herself falling, she caught at the curtain, and a cry of anguish was wafted down to the street—"Max! Max!"

The music ceased suddenly, and an instant later swift footsteps reached her door, and Delorme, laying his violin down, had gathered her up into his arms.

Sylva— his Sylva— found again, after close search, but dead!

He stooped and pressed his lips to the colorless face; and as he did so, a ray of life returned to it and she opened her eyes, murmuring his name again.

THE ANNOUNCEMENT of a new turn at the Brevity Theatre had brought some of its patrons, who were inclined to drop off, back again.

Max Delorme, the New York violinist, was to contribute a special feature with his wife.

There was a sensation of interest as he played a short solo, and said it was a preliminary to an announcement he wished to make to them. The management had advertised him liberally as the artist who had broken a fifteen-thousand-dollar contract to come over and play for them. He laid his violin down as Syhra entered, and, taking her by the hand, led her to the footlights.

In a few impassioned words, he told them that she was their former favorite Sylva White, whose accident, caused intentionally by a member of her company, had debarred her from re-appearing on the stage until new. She would repeat her former dance, he added; and, he hoped, her former success.

Lovelier than ever, with the old witchery of face and form, the heart of the audience was at her command from the moment he finished his speech, and, withdrawing to the side, resumed his violin to play for her.

Carew Blane leant forward in his box amazed and ashamed. Sylva never glanced at him, even when his plaudits joined the others.

Instead, she smiled divinely at Max, and stretched out her hand for him to take the call at her side.

The house stood up to greet her; some inkling of the truth, which had been current at the time, recurred to the minds of a few off those present, and they gave her a tremendous ovation.

At last, when they allowed her to go. the next turn was indicated, and Julia Joy came on.

A storm of booing assailed her; she looked frightened, and faltered: the gallery jeered and the pit cheered ironically.

Hardly anyone knew the reason, but It made an amusing variation to the evening.

Julia sent an imploring look up to Blane's box. But Blane had disappeared!

Again Julia began to dance, and the booing started afresh; while some small object was hurled at her derisively from the gallery.

She stamped her feet, raged at them for a moment, and then, bursting into angry tears, made her exit.

The tumult continuing. Max and Sylva were entreated by the management to reappear.

The moment they did so, the disturbance subsided, and clapping all over the house showed its entire approval.

As Sylva took her encore, the past vanished as an ugly dream that dies at dawn.

Only the triumphant present and the smiling future were in the melody that Max improvised as she took her old place on the Brevity stage.

________________________

12: The Closed Door

Egerton Castle

1858-1920

World's News (Sydney) 8 July 1916

"MY DEAR, I never was so amazed in all my life!"

Lady Mary looked quizzically at her companion. There was a half smile on her pretty, faded face.

"Young people are not very easy to under-stand nowadays," she remarked at last. "My grand-daughter belongs to her generation."

Mrs. Vansittart exclaimed:—

"Now, Mary, that's not fair! You just want to put me off. Agatha is not a bit like the modern girl, and everyone knows she was quite devoted to Lord Sark. Such a marriage too! Everything a woman could wish for, and a nice, good-looking youth into the bargain."

The visitor paused, and from between carefully blacked eyelashes shot a shrewd look at her hostess.

"I hear something happened up at that wild place— Larnes, where she was staying with the Glenmores, and that she wrote him an extraordinary rigmarole the other day! His mother says she's gone mad."

"The child's not mad," said Lady Mary, a little stiffly, "hasn't every woman a right to change her mind?"

"Now, Mary!"

"Well, Charlotte, you're right! It's not that. But if I told you the story, I'm afraid you, too, would think her mad."

"You don't, then?"

"No," said the other slowly, "but then I'm Scotch, you see, and— it's in our blood— we can't help believing—''

"My dear Mary," said Mrs. Vansittart, drawing her chair a little nearer, and leaning forward, "you know I'm discretion itself."

Lady Mary cast a musing glance round her attractive Mayfair drawing-room, all delicate Chippendale and rosebud chintz, a bower, just now, with spring blossoms. Then she let her gaze rest upon her contemporary's bewigged, bewhitened and berouged countenance, and wondered parenthetically if poor Charlotte imagined these outrageous repairs made her look younger.

At last she spoke, gentle satire in her eye and voice.

"Perhaps it is just as well that you should know the truth. You're bound to hear a dozen versions, all of them false. The fact is, my little Agatha met someone she liked better."

Mrs. Vansittart screamed. This was the last thing she expected.

"Better than Sark? Mary, what nonsense! Why, how could she? And they'd only been engaged ten days, and there were no young men at Glenmores. That I ascertained for a fact!"

"Nevertheless it was somebody she met at Larnes."

"Somebody she had never met before?"

The other hesitated. Her smile flickered. "No— yes—"

"Oh, I see it all! Some undesirable— a tuppenny ha'penny, wretched little officer, no doubt, who, hearing about her and Sark, had the audacity to come after her. My dear Mary, you can't allow it for a moment. You must squash this absolutely. It's not too late. After all, the poor child is motherless, and men are not a bit of use. You'll have to act."

"I've done what I could."

"Well, what does her father say?"

"He says he won't have her teased."

"I always knew he was the most selfish creature! He's only too glad to keep her at home, I daresay. He is selfish, Mary. Why don't you get at the young man?"

"That would be difficult," said Lady Mary.

She put her Sevres cup back on the tea-tray, carefully straightened a bread and butter plate, and placed the Melon teapot under the exact centre of the urn spout, and then she said in an everyday voice:—

"He doesn't happen to be alive."

Mrs Vansittart screamed again. "Dead!"

Then her voice dropped to a deep tone of gloom.

"Suicide!" And once more rebounded to the heights. "What inconceivable luck! Of course, poor Agatha's a little upset, but that will pass. I'll tell Sark—" She broke off.

"Mary, you look dreadfully mysterious. It's very unfair. You promised to tell me."

"I've been fully occupied in answering your questions, Charlotte. I don't mind telling you the story, but I'm afraid you will never understand it. If I promised, of course, I must. You know Larnes, at least by reputa tion. It passes for being one of the most haunted houses in all haunted Scotland. Lady Glenmore met Agatha this winter in Edinburgh— took a fancy to her, and asked her up for Easter. That was just after her en gagement to Sark was announced. She ac cepted the invitation without consulting any one. None of us quite knew why she said she would go. Her father thinks she was already then not quite happy in her decision."

Mrs. Vansittart scoffed.

"The with was father to the thought there, I expect!"

"I expect Agatha wanted to see Larnes," said Lady Mary; "you know how everything mystic has always attracted her."

There was a discontented murmur from the listener, that Sark would have been the very person to put a stop to all that. Once more Lady Mary had her small, private smile. She smoothed her taffeta silk lap with hands still white and soft, glittering with many old-fashioned rings.

"There was nobody up there, but just the old couple themselves and the two daughters."

"My dear, Hetty and Suky, those poor elderly Macdougal girls! How dull! Why on earth didn't they ask Sark?"

"Sark was out with his Yeomary. Agatha didn't find it at all dull. I have letters from her here somewhere. I happened to be reading them over just when you came in."

Lady Mary sought in her work-basket and drew out an envelope, adjusted her specta-cles, and, spreading a closely-written sheet, began to read:—

"This is the most delightful place. I've never imagined anything like it. Fancy, darling, there's only one door to the castle still. One goes straight into the keep, just as in the old, old days, and there's the nar-row stone entrance, and the rugged steps, and the rope to pull yourself up by, till you come into the great hall. Wasn't it odd? I felt the instant I arrived as If I knew it. as if it was all familiar, and all dear. Lady Susan says there has been an inter-marriage— she's great on pedigrees— so perhaps it's an inherited memory—"

"My dear Mary," broke in Mrs. Vansittart, in a protesting bass, "how can you let the child batten on such nonsense?"

"It's very wild, and strange, and simple, and noble, somehow," went on the reader, neglecting the interruption; "to-morrow I am going over the castle. Lady Susan says nobody really knows how many secret places are hidden away, nor has anyone ever de-termined exactly the different ghost stories. The servants are always seeing things. There is one room particularly haunted. Those who sleep there have a most tragic sense of restless misery, although I believe nothing is seen. Lady Susan says she won't hear of my moving into it, but I want to. I am going to coax Lady Harriet. She's awfully quaint and nice. She talks and tells stories all the time, without ever stopping, which have no apparent connection with the rest of the conversation, but she's a dear."

Lady Mary put down the letter and took up another.

"This is dated Easter Sunday," remarked Mrs. Vansittart, her mouth slightly open, her eyes fixed, was listening with a mixed expression of absorbed attention and raillery, which gave her the air of a rather dilapidated parrot.

Lady Mary, casting a fugitive glance at her over the top of the sheet she was unfolding, noticed a faint, palsied movement of her crony's golden head, and reflected, not without complacency, that in spite of all poor Charlotte's efforts, she herself had worn considerably better. But she was beginning to feel pleasure in her own narration, and she took up the thread of it again with alacrity.

"Easter Sunday," Agatha writes. "I've been in the haunted room, Granny dear, and it's curiouser and curiouser, as Alice in Wonderland says. It's the very room I've dreamt of ever since I was quite a little girl. You remember my nightmare when I wasn't well; a great, dim room, with tapestry set into the wall, and an immense, very low bed, hung with green. How frightened I used to be of that dream! And yet there was nothing so dreadful in it, for after all, it was only that I felt there was something behind the tapestry that either wanted to get at me, or that I wanted to get at. Something that wasn't horrible, only piteous. You haven't forgotten how you laughed at me, and tried to console me by telling me you had dreamt of a blue donkey when you were a little girl, and it only meant indigestion."

Mrs. Vansittart gave a faint snort.

"The mistake," she opined, "was in letting the child go to that silly, ghostly house at all. I'm sure they gave her cockleleeky or haggis! Enough to upset anybody's digestion."

"That couldn't have made her dream of the room before she went there," retorted Lady Mary.

"No, my dear, but it predisposed her to delusions. Go on. The next thing, I suppose, is that that fool Hetty— everyone knows she's half-witted— let the girl go and sleep there! Oh, that Scotch set, I know them! not a bawbee to their names, nothing to uphold their dignity but their gibbering ghosts!"

"The funny thing is," pursued Lady Mary imperturbably, still reading, "that I wasn't a bit frightened of the room when I saw it. I only felt the most overwhelming desire to occupy it, and dear, kind old Hetty says—"

"What did I tell you? She ought to be shut up."

"—I may go in to-morrow night, not to-day, because of the Sabbath."

Lady Mary replaced the letter in its envelope, returned it with its fellow to the work-basket, folded her little hands, and looked at her friend.

"I did not hear from Agatha again till she had gone back to Herefordshire, and then only three lines, in which she said: 'I have broken off my engagement to Lord Sark, and it is quite irrevocable!' "

"Mary, Mary, it's mad, it's— do you mean to say it's because she saw something in that room? Do you mean—?"

"I did not have the full explanation, Charlotte, till Agatha herself came to see me last week. Then I heard all from her lips. She took possession of the room, she told me, With the same feeling of pleasure and familiarity that she had experienced when first crossing the threshold 'It was just as if I was coming home,' she said to me. She had no sense of apprehension, it was indeed with a feeling of relief that, after an endless gossip, she saw kind, garrulous Hetty Mac-dougal take her departure that night, with her flat candlestick. There's nothing modern at Larnes, as you can imagine! But Agatha had a good fire and four pairs of wax candles. She sat up by that fire for some time, thinking. 'It wasn't so much thinking, Granny,' she said, 'as feeling! I was happy and yet sad, peaceful and yet wanting something. I can't quite describe it,' the child said, 'but I wasn't a bit jumpy. It was rather as if I'd just reached the one point I'd unconsciously wished for all my life, like— like when one is prepared for the first time for the Sacrament.' "

Mrs. Vansittart gave a deprecating cough. She was not pious, but she had very strong ideas on the subject of religions decorum. Lady Mary was High Church, like many Jacobites, and Mrs. Vansittart never felt herself so nearly belonging to the Elect as in her disapproval of Romish tenets.

"Agatha thought it must be past midnight when she got into bed, but she became very sleepy all at once, she told me, and bundled In without looking at her watch."

Here Lady Mary stopped, as if only just aware of the condemnatory cough, and Mrs. Vansittart, who was beginning to feel an agreeable trickle of cold water down her spine, gave an involuntary shake of her head, and tartly bade her to go on for Heaven's sake.

"She doesn't know how long she slept, or whether she dreamt." Lady Mary's voice had assumed an accent of emotion. Mrs. Vansittart gave a nervous look over her shoulder and shifted her hands. '"But she woke up, sitting straight in bed, with one clear, urgent thought; she must see what was behind the tapestry. All the dreams of her childhood were upon her. There was the hanging, with the faded deer and the monstrous trees, torn just where she had always seen it torn, and patched with a bit of laurel bough in the very middle of a hound's body. She knew quite well What she had to do, for she had done it so often in her sleep. She must lift up that corner of the tapestry where it was loose. It could be pulled away from the panel, and she would see behind it the closed door. Whether she would get the door open was another ques-tion. She had never been able to. That had been her nightmare. But one thing was quite certain; she must try.

"She got out of bed," continued Lady Mary, "put on her dressing gown, thrust her feet into her slippers, and went across the room to the tapestry panel. She had left a candle burning. However brave one may be," said the old lady, with a faintly tremulous smile, "one does not go to sleep in a haunted room with the chance of waking up in the dark. Well, she put the candlestick down on the floor, and she lifted up the tapestry by the corner. True to her dream, it was loose, and, with a little effort, she drew it away from the panel. In the stone wall she saw the outline of a door."

Mrs. Vansittart gave a gulp, which she endeavored to cover by another cough. Nonsense, of course, but really a little creepy!

"Then Agatha said," the grandmother went on, "Agatha said she did feel rather as if her nightmare had come back, because some force which seemed outside herself drove her to try and open that door. 'If I had known that I should find my death on the other side, Granny, yet, I must have gone on'— those were her words— 'And at first I thought I could never move it, and all the dust got up my nose, and the tapestry kept falling back upon me, and it was a kind of agony. I wanted to cry. I wanted to get away, but I couldn't. And then I think I prayed, I don't know. Perhaps that helped, but some bolt gave way inside. I heard the clank of its fall— I suppose it was rusted through— anyhow the door came open—' "

"Don't stop," said Mrs. Vansittart in a high voice.

"The door came open," repeated Lady Mary slowly. "My dear Charlotte, such a breath of tomblike cold, such a blast as of death and the grave, 'the very breath of mortality,' she said, rushed upon her, that her courage failed her. She clapped the door to and dropped the tapestry over it and picked up her candle and went back to the fire. She couldn't go to bed again, poor child, she was frightened. She was more than half tempted, she said, to fly the room and seek refuge with Lady Hetty, but once more something stronger than her panic held her back, inexplicably, with a sense as of duty. It seemed to her, so she tried to explain it to me, as if a call were made upon her to be brave, for the sake of someone, someone unknown, who had yet always been inconceivably close to her. She sat down in the big armchair and made Up the fire, and put the candle on the little table, and was just saying to herself, 'I will read,' to calm the turmoil in her pulses, when she heard steps behind her."

"Ugh!" screamed Charlotte Vansittart.

"No, she wasn't frightened then. On the Instant, all that left her. It fell off her, she said, like a cloak. She was only happy— my little Agatha said— suddenly, wonderfully happy.

A man came leaping into the room from that door she had opened. She heard the thud of the tapestry falling back behind him. He had heavy boots-riding boots—and a buff jerkin, she thinks, but she has only a vague impression of Jacobean garments. She saw the dust scatter from him as he came, and remembers that there wore cobwebs hanging from his sword-belt. He fell on his knees before her, and she saw his face 'as clearly,' she said, 'as I see yours now, Granny, more clearly.And I knew I had known it always, and had been wanting always to see it again!' She tried to describe it to me— locks tossed and disordered, an olive, thin face with great brown eyes. He was panting. He looked up at her, and then he said, 'Sweetheart!.. Sweet-heart!.. Sweetheart!' three times."

Lady Mary paused and drew a breath, hesitated, and went on.

"Having got so far, Charlotte, I will finish the story as simply as it was told me. My poor child said her heart was beating with a rapture she could never have believed possible. It was too much for any human heart to bear. She was drawn down towards him, not by any touch of his hands, for she knows those were clasped as he knelt, as if he had been, in prayer. But she was drawn towards him by something, in herself that answered to his cry, and they kissed. A deadly cold struck at her then, and she does not remember anything any more until she found herself in Lady Hetty's bed, with that good-natured creature loudly lamenting above her, and half a bottle of vinegar spilt over her."

Mrs. Vansittart gave a flat, uncertain cackle. "Well, Mary, you have taken a rise out of me! It was just a silly dream, I suppose— though, of course, that doesn't quite explain her having fainted, does it? I daresay people do dream when they're fainting. One sees all sorts of things when one has a tooth out and gets gas! A Mary, don't be aggravating! Go on!"

"I have only a little left to tell you," said Lady Mary, "and the rest you know. It seems Hetty, not being very comfortable in her mind, had come two or three times to Agatha's door to listen. She heard a fall and went inthe found Agatha in a dead faint, and— this is the most horrible part of the story, and I don't know how you or anyone else will ex-plain it— there was a heap of bones and fragments of a buff coat and jack-boots and a rusty sword beside the child's chair."

"Oh!— Oh! Mary! Oh, how horrible— oh, stop! Oh, I can't believe it! Dreadful, dreadful! I see it all, of course. Agatha was sleep walking. She opened that awful hiding place and dragged out the skeleton, then woke, saw the horror of it, and fainted."

"That's what the doctor said. Nevertheless I am glad to be quite certain that Agatha never saw that heap of long, long dead humanity. Agatha only remembers— wait a minute, I have still something to show you."

Once again the old lady dived into her workbasket, to produce this time an unmounted

photograph, which she handed to her crony with the words:—

"The portrait of the seventh Lord Glenmore, by Isaac Oliver. It hangs still in the Banqueting Hall at Larnes. It is well drawn. They say it is the only life-sized portrait painted by Oliver."

"Good gracious!" said Mrs. Vansittart. She produced her gold-mounted eye-glass, stared, and exclaimed again, "Good gracious! Do you think anyone was ever as handsome as that? Why, the child fell in love with the picture! So that's the man she thought she saw?"

"That's the man she saw. The man she prefers to Lord Sark."

"Mary!"

"He's known in the family tradition as the missing Lord Glenmore."

"Missing!"

"He was never seen or heard of after he had taken the King's leave at St. James's Palace. It was believed he had perished in a sea journey, on his way back from London. The vessel in which he was supposed to have sailed had been wrecked on the coast of Leith with all hands. But now—"

"Mary, you don't mean the bones—"

"Wait a minute, I must explain a little more first. He had a young wife, whom he adored. When he was summoned to the Court in London by King James, he left her at Larnes with her infant son. There came a great pestilence in the village and castle. Nearly all the servants were stricken, and young Lady Glenmore herself; she only lived long enough to give orders that the infant heir should be removed from contagion. It was said that the clergyman even would not come near the place, and that she was buried by an old seneschal. There was also a legend," said Lady Mary slowly, "that Lord Glenmore had been seen about the place— Lord Glenmore or his wraith— a few hours after her death. No one credited the tale. That was in the year 1613. It has taken three hundred years for the truth to be known."

Mrs. Vansittart looked again at the photo-graph, and as her hand shook she put it down.

"I mean," said her friend, answering the rather terrified appeal in her eyes, "that it is now evident Lord Glenmore did come back, to find his wife dead; that in the agony of his despair he rushed into that secret chamber, where he had set up a kind of laboratory. He was a mystic and a student of the occult, meddled with astrology and alchemy too, for he was a friend of Robert Fludd— a celebrated Cabalist and Rosicrucian, they say. God knows what frantic task he had set himself— to brew some elixir, or call up some spirit, that would restore life to his beloved. Two or three yellowed sheets of paper were found, all marked with calculations and strange signs, and then a despairing scrawl:—'I'd sell my soul and serve three hundred years for one last kiss!' That rash prayer was granted."

"But— my dear— I really feel," said Mrs. Vansittart feebly, "as if my head was going round. Will you give me another cup of tea, Mary? Why should Agatha?— You don't really believe that Agatha was his wife come back?"

"I don't know what to believe, but it's quite clear that Agatha is determined that she will wed no other man."

"But if he's nothing but bones?"

"Please remember, Charlotte, Agatha knows nothing about the bones. She is never to know. They told her they found the dust of the long dead, and they have given her a ring which they took from his finger. She will wear that ring, and never one of any other man."

"Poor Sark!" cried Mrs. Vansittart. She was furious, she was not convinced, but she was awed.

"Poor Agatha," said her grandmother, with a little sigh; "and yet she is not unhappy."

__________________________

13: Lord Hillayton's Settlement

Dorothea Conyers

(Dorothea Blood-Smyth Conyers White, 1869-1949)

World's News (Sydney) 20 Jan 1917

MARGOT ERSTINE had acquired a reputation for being clever. She was a slightly made, colorless maiden of twenty-seven, with a bright manner and a certain way of pursing her lips when anyone made a social mistake which made her friends realise that Margot knew she would never "have done that." A flutter of sandy eye-lashes and a little sneer; and by degrees the reputation was built up.

Margot always thought things out, she was careful to be sweet and very pleasant to desirable hostesses.

"Such a nice girl in a house," they said, "and quite safe."

This implied that the eldest sons were not liable to be attracted by a well born but almost penniless girl.

Margot's mother had a bright little flat, and Margot was well dressed, but it had leaked out that most of the Erstines' income came from an annuity to Mrs. Erstine.

And now at last Margot was engaged. She had proves her cleverness. Her fiance was small and podgy with a surprised expression in his eyes, which sometimes deepened now when he looked at his fiancee, but he was heir presumptive to Lord Hillayton who was sixty and a confirmed bachelor.

Margot had planned little expeditions and meetings; she had planned the evening in the flat when mother was called out, and the proposal had been shaken from Freddie Marayon.

She planned the honeymoon and the future, and of course, no nicely brought up girl wants anyone to die... but she decided on silver tissue for her presentation dress when She was Lady Hillayton, and she had already thought of prospective tenants for the Scotch fishing they could pay visits in August.

Margot met her future uncle and gushed sweetly to him of her devotion to Freddie, her determination to be happy on their teeny weeny little income in a little flat somewhere near dear Freddie's clubs and things, and Harrod's for cheap shopping. "Go to live up the country." Margot repressed a squeak of horror. "So dreadfully bad for a man unless be had lots of horses and so on— so depressing with all the people who were there shut away at five o'clock, and an extra maid to do lamps and grates."

"A flat would suit you best," said his Lordship grimly.

He was really fairly generous to Freddie. He allowed him five hundred a year, and Freddie had seven of his own. This was completely out of kindness, but as Margot said for a man with an income of thirty thousand it was mean.

"Darling Freddie, you may say he spends it," said Margot sweetly, she was always just a little superior in her manner. "But— at sixty one ought not to want to spend it. Hunters, motors, when he knows that his heir must travel in a 'bus."

The preparations for the wedding went on smoothly. Margot spent blissful hours trying on frocks, rich relations, happily relieved of Margot's long visits and Margot's clever little letters asking so diffidently tor help, sent cheques for frocks and frills. Margot was buying cautiously and cleverly. Good furs, laces, a few beautiful frocks.

"If you could lend me that lace blouse, dear Clare, for my little woman to copy. I could never afford to go to Jap for one like it."

Ten to one that dear Clare said "take the thing," carelessly, "and have copies made. I've worn it once "

Clever Margot got old lace from her Aunt Jennie, more from a distant cousin. She priced and contrived and mapped out, but, there was a crumpled rose leaf.

She wanted the dearest of little houses close to Park Lane— a bijou maisonette sandwiched between stately neighbors. It was replete with electric lights and fires, with varieties of baths and two little conservatories. Margot knew how she would keep these filled by her uncle's gardeners. But the price was eighteen thousand pounds.

With an income of twelve hundred the house seemed a dream to everyone except Margot, and she relied on her cleverness.

"If your uncle would only give it to us for a wedding present, Freddie," she said. "We should be rent free for ever. Think of it."

Freddie was not at all sure that he liked the tiny ornate rooms on which you were brought up by the window immediately you shut the door— he said electric fires were dangerous y'know. S'pose the current went astray, weren't there lives wires and things like the Underground?

But Margot's heart was set on it and Freddie was clay in the hands of the potter.

Margot's active brain worked, and suddenly as Margot read a paper, Margot shrieked— she saw her way.

Freddie, who was feeling neglected, said "Wasp or Bee," and as an afterthought, "Blue bag either case;" but Margot merely replied, "Silly," as she seized his arm.

"Know any actresses, Freddie. Any actresses?" she jerked out wildly.

Freddie replied "Course," with an injured air. At twenty-six not to know actresses was an allegation no man of the world could stand.

"Friends with any, Fred?"

Freddie grew cautious. He tried to make looks do duty for words, he changed the surprised look for that of the sly dog and he smiled, cryptically.

Margot said all men were alike, and he must know heaps. "They must have raced for you, dear," she said eagerly.

Freddie stiffened his short little neck.

"Knowing whose nephew you were. And cof course for yourself," Margot saw her mistake immediately. "But look here, Freddie, darling. Oh, such an idea."

Margot held out the "Daily Splendor," showing the headlines of a breach of promise case. Peer's son and Gaiety girl, claim for fifty thousand.

"If you had a real pal, Freddie. You could give her a five hundred— in diamonds, of course, because you mustn't spend half of it. Oh, can't you understand. Then listen."

Then clever Margot sat on Freddie's somewhat wobbly knew and unfolded her scheme, and Freddie gasped as he said he didn't like it, but by degrees he began to see.

Now Freddie did know an actress, quite well. She was a light in one of the musical comedies, and she was the daughter of a man near Hillayton Hall. Freddie had got her an introduction, he had helped her to settle down, and had asked her out to supper. Estelle Ersmond, her name was Paxton, was grateful, she was a merry girl, tall and handsome, with a keen sense of humor. Margot danced with sheer delight.

But Miss Erstine disturbed her Freddie's diplomacy, she called on Miss Ersmond next day herself, and plunged into it with a cleverness which made the actress arch her eyebrows. Margot's gushing condescension was in her own opinion exact, right, also her sweet manner and clever explanations. After a little Miss Ersmond looked at Freddie, who was apparently cutting his teeth on his umbrella handle, and she laughed a merry, ringing laugh.

"It's horribly mean," she said frankly.

Margot now arched her eyebrows because this was familiar, but she ran on as to Freddie's longing for the house, and their poverty and a man with millions a year, so mean and hard to his heir. "Isn't he, Freddie?"

Freddie endeavored not to think of a three figure cheque sent for his honeymoon which was in his pocket-book.

The interview was eventually successful.

Clever Margot went away leaving Freddie writing laboriously at the actress's table, and Miss Ersmond dictating merrily, though she still said that it was mean.

ON THE afternoon of the next day Miss Ersmond took a taxi and drove to Grosvenor Square. She sent in her card with "urgent" marked on it. She was shown into a cool room furnished with mellow Sheraton and Chippendale, and with sporting pictures adorning the walls. A tea table was placed close to the open window.

Miss Ersmond began to look at the pictures of the horses.

"Favorites of mine which I bring to town. I detest a conventional drawing-room in a bachelor's house."

Estelle turned to see a man of nearly sixty who did not look fifty, his reddish hair only tinged with grey, his skin clear and firm. He had humorous grey eyes and a pleasant voice.

"I—" said Miss Ersmond, startled. "Yes, I like the bay."

"My best horse," said Lord Hillayton. "Irish, with old Victor blood in her. Ah. yes. Adams, tea for two. Now, Miss— yes— Ersmond, you wish to see me?"

Estelle, very pink, begged him not to think of tea. She produced with decision, two letters and handed them to her host, who read them without glasses. He turned to the signature and sighed.

"I— never thought he had it in him," said Lord Hillayton, almost proudly. "These are a man's leters. Freddie writing these. Dear me— you might have made a man of him, too," he said regretfully.

Miss Ersmond gasped and sat down.

"A cup of tea," said Hillayton, kindly, "Thanks, Adams, that will do. I presume," he went on, "you are showing these commercially." His voice hardened.

Estelle set her teeth, as she nodded.

"Of the Gaiety," she said, almost gruffly, "in the Diamond Girl. You may have seen me."

"I— no— I go to Opera when I can get away from the House. Of the Gaiety! Yes. Freddie, I am astounded."

"I want." said Estelle, trying not to falter, "twenty thousand for those letters. I shall get fifty in the Courts."

"Not from Freddie," said his uncle softly. "H'm! He's engaged to a sandy-haired society girl. H'm! Most of the newspapers would probably, pay you to bring it on. He has treated you rottenly, Miss Ersmond— judging by these."

A flicker of laughter came unbidden round Estelle's lips. She repressed it and looked at the horses, but she knew it had been noted.

"You rode that bay," she said suddenly, "the long hunt from Constons Spinneys, four years ago. I short-cutted on my cob and saw you come in first to Winnermere."

"You like hunting!" said Hillayton, astonished.

"I have had one hunt on a really good horse," she answered. "A grey— lent to me. I come from near Hillayton— that brown has bad hocks, hasn't he. I've seen him, too."

The motor had waited for half an hour before they finished discussing the horses. Then Estelle looked at her watch. She had to dine at half-past six.

There was something in her eyes which she tried to hide when she faced Lord Hillayton.

"I— came to blackmail you, and you've treated me as an ordinary visitor," she faltered.

"No," said Hillayton, thoughtfully. "Never as that."

"And— I— Oh, bother Freddie," she burst out with a crinkled forehead.

"You would have made a man of him," said Freddie's uncle. "Sent him out to get his podgy fat off, well, well. I'll drive you back, Miss Ersmond, and there are some carnations here fresh from the country, if you'd honor me."

The chauffeur remarked to the wheel that he was blest, as Miss Ersmond got into the car, and they hummed past Hyde Park towards Kensington.

Lord Hillayton saw the Diamond Girl next night, and frowned thoughtfully. He was not fond of paint and feathers and display of limbs, but he applauded loudly when Estelle sang "Little Country Birdees" with a trill of feeling in her pretty voice.

"What a pity," said Freddie's uncle.

TEN DAYS later clever Margot saw to the purchase of the little house; she also chose some showy but badly colored diamonds at a shop near Charing Cross, and sent them to Miss Etetelle Ersmond. She even asked Miss Ersmond to tea, to see the presents. They poured in, glitter of their silver, and softness of mother of pearl, and red radiance of mock antique furniture, but Margot pursed her lips when nothing came from Freddie's uncle.

He wrote to say that he was called away, and could not be at the wedding in September.

Margot's brow was puckered on her wedding day because no present had arrived. She told her friends that she was to choose it with her dear uncle when he came back to town— he was away now on his yacht. She hinted at a tiara, but she was nevertheless uneasy, and gent such a sweet letter telling of all her best gifts, and how she hoped to show them to her dear uncle in their tiny house, which they had got for positively nothing. They would love some little pots of flowers for it from Hillayton, and so on.

Clever Margot and dull Freddie honeymooned in Paris, where it was rather chilly, and Margot did not understand French quite as well as she might have, so felt irritated when Freddie laughed immoderately at the theatres. Then they returned to London and the new toy house.

It was only partly furnished, the air of uprest which hangs over all new houses was upon it, the new maids were in difficulties with the electric contrivances, and Margot was a little worn by dinner time.

Then she began to open a bundle of letters. "One from my uncle," said Freddie, "and a cheque at last."

"Which I shall want so much," said Margot, "Freddie, don't say, 'by gum!' What is in it. Freddie? Why do you look like an owl?"

"It's for £20— no, for £2,000."

"I say, Freddie."

She snatched the letter.

Dear Fred,

I had not forgotten a wedding present as Margot seems to hint; you see I had really given you rather a handsome one, which I said nothing about. I enclose the letters written by you which I purchased. Perhaps you do not know that I was myself married in July to Estelle Ersmond; we come back to Hillayton in a week. Margot is so clever she will understand that I have now ties of my own, and with already expectations of an heir or heiress, I do not see my way to a permanent allowance. But I believe £2,000 to make the sum given to you up to £20,000 as your final wedding present. It wasn't quite a nice trick to play, was it?— yet it has made me a wonderfully happy man, and I must always thank clever Margot for it.

I remain,

Your affectionate Uncle, H.

P.S.—Aunt sends her love.

Margot sat very still for a little.

"We— shall have to sell this house," she said hysterically. "All your fault, Freddie, not showing those letters yourself. All your fault."

"Gwacious!" said Freddie, "Gwacious!"

"All my cleverness wasted!" stormed Margot. "My thought... you stupid."

"Don't believe we'll get ten thousand for this band-box, either," said Freddie cheerlessly. "I'll put the wedding presents away, Margot, carefully."

Margot had nothing left to say.

____________________

14: The Four Invisibles

Egerton Castle

Adventure, May 3 1919

1: The End of the Three Choughs

AS THE brown dusk began to rise in the vale of Winterbourne Stanton, one Mr. Daniells— a person of some consequence in that retired nook of "Dorset Dear," no less an one indeed than butler to Sir Jasper Ferrars of Stanton Manor— was leaning against a stile, lost in disconsolate contemplation. With hands in his breeches pockets, smoking an elfin pipe, he contemplated the cold ruin of what but a week before had been that well-found, alluring halfway-house known on the road from Poole to Salisbury as the old Three Choughs. The destruction was complete; the desertion of the spot absolute. The whilom cozy inn and its self-supplying dependencies were razed to the ground, mere heaps of charred stone and all but consumed timber.

The blast of an Autumnal storm— and the equinoctial gales of that year, 1817, had been the fiercest in living man's memory— had seen to it that not a foot should be spared. The Three Choughs had been the only dwelling on the margin of the bare silent downs within a mile around— a place of pleasant, quietly moving life. But now the great stillness had crept down from the heights and held the spot in its own solemnity.

For many years Mr. Daniells, in his off time, had been a patron of that cheery house of call. Of late, indeed, his office at the manor having sunk into sinecure, he had become something like a standing institution much valued and respected in the snuggery. Now this solatium of a monotonous existence was snatched from him. But the long habit of a leisurely evening walk across corn-fields and meadows to the site of the kindly hostelry had not yet been shaken off. Every sundown since the catastrophe had seen Mr. Daniells at the stile, musing, Marius like, upon the ruins and ready to deplore the new melancholy of the vale with the passer-by.

That evening of October the third the road seemed more than usually deserted. The companionable Mr. Daniells had not had one opportunity for a word with any creature capable of the least interesting gossip, the thinnest discussion. The last cart, thoroughly apathetic, had rumbled past half an hour since. Over the furrowed stubble on this side of the road, across the bare down stretching yonder away, deep silence reigned, broken only now and again, indeed emphasized, by the melancholy cry of plover or gull, the parting croak of rooks winging off to their roost in the margin woods of Stanton.

The lonely man's pipe had burned down to its end. He straightened himself, reluctantly preparing to retrace his way home toward supper— and another dull evening.

But he checked himself; a wayfarer had appeared at the southern bend of the road.

Mr. Daniells leaned back once more, awaiting the event. Had it not been for this impulse of indolent curiosity, more than one episode of a startling nature would never have occurred in parts quite singularly remote from Dorset, and the course of several lives, perfectly unknown to Sir Jasper's butler, would have flowed into strangely different channels.

As the newcomer approached, Mr. Daniells discerned that it was a young man, dressed— as an eye well-accustomed to note such matters promptly recognized— in clothes of well-fitting, gentlemanly cut, if perhaps somewhat outworn, and— what seemed certainly an eccentricity in one thus attired— carrying an obviously irksome portmanteau. The wayfarer's gait indicated weariness. Presently he stopped and cast puzzled looks right and left, as a man might who has lost his bearings. Then, catching sight of the ruined heap, he advanced with quickened step.

After gazing a while, lost in a muse, he slowly turned round and, apparently for the first time noticing the still figure by the stile, addressed it in a voice and manner of easy civility, which confirmed the major-domo's first impression of his social status.

"Can you tell me— surely I'm not mistaken? This was the old inn."

"Yes— the Three Choughs, sir," Mr. Daniells replied, with alacrity detaching himself from his resting position to cross over. "Burned down, a week tomorrow. A great loss to the countryside, sir," he added, touching his cap as if to bring to the stranger's notice the fact that he knew a gentleman, dust, travel-stain and personally carried portmanteau notwithstanding.

"I have no doubt of it," said the young man. "And a loss to me. I knew the place well. An excellent inn. A loss to me," he repeated, bringing back his gaze to the scene of destruction, "this evening of all times! I particularly wished to stay here tonight. The Salisbury coach dropped me at the crossway. This is cursed luck. I meant to sleep here tonight. And I am dog tired."

He wheeled round again, cast his portmanteau on the roadside and sat down on the step of the stile. Then, folding his hands over his tucked-up knees, he resumed for a spell his discontented frowning at the ruins.

"The nearest place, I believe," he said at last, "is Keyning, and that is—"

"A good hour's walk and a bit more. It's — hem — bad luck, as you said, sir," affirmed Mr. Daniells sympathetically. "I see you know this part of the country. The Harvest Moon, at Keyning, is not a bad lace. But it's not the Choughs. No, not by a long chalk, as they say. I, for one, have regretted the Choughs every evening these seven days, as much, if I may say so, as you do this evening, sir. The only spot, for one thing, where one had a chance of talking, easy-like, to some one after a lonely day. This is a lonely place, sir. And l—"

"Ah, well, thank you, my friend," the young man cut in, wearily getting up again and seizing his bag once more. He was in no mood for chatting, but still spoke pleasantly enough. "No use sitting here, cursing Fate. Good evening to you. It's getting late and I had best get along— unless," he stopped upon a new thought, "unless you could tell me of some decent cottage hereabouts, where they would give me a shake-down and a morsel of supper— for the price I would have paid at the Three Choughs."

"Why, sir—" Mr. Daniells hesitated—"it comes to me— that is, if you cared to accept of it— I could supply you with the accommodation myself. Either free— and welcome, sir. Or," he  hastened to add, "or, if you should prefer it, I say— on the same terms. The Choughs were never the house to fleece the traveler. And it's very lonesome at the hall," he went on, almost pleading. "Dreary, I call it. It's close by, too-"

"At the hall? Close by, did you say? Surely, you never mean Stanton?"

"Stanton, to be sure, sir. I see you know the country— Stanton Manor. Maybe you know Sir Jasper himself— knew him, I should say, for Heaven only knows what's become of Sir Jasper!"

There was a pause. And at last:

"By George!" said the traveler, and that was all.

For a while he remained, gazing absently at the other's face without seeing— he was looking beyond. At length, recovering himself:

"I really beg your pardon, my man," he said; "my thoughts were far away. Sir Jasper? Yes, I know of Sir Jasper. He is from home, say you? And whom am I speaking to, if you don't mind telling me?"

"I am the butler. Daniells is my name, sir. There is only me and my wife left at the hall. The other servants have been gone these months. But I'm in charge. I think, in a manner of speaking, I may use my discretion. And I wouldn't like to leave a gentleman— for I can see with half an eye when a gentleman is a gentleman, as the saying goes, stranded on our road. And the hall is empty— oh, empty it is, sir— and that lonesome! And it lies closer than any place— now the old Choughs is gone. And I make bold to say, if Sir Jasper were at home, he would approve of my bringing in a gentleman in such circumstances.

A smile hovered for a moment over the young man's lips.

"So you really think, Mr. Daniells, that if Sir Jasper were at home, he would wel¬ come me at Stanton— in the circumstances? I must take your word for that. I would have thanked you for the offer, even if it had not saved me another hour's tramp with this infernal bag. As it is, I accept gratefully— on the condition, however, that we look upon the hall, for tonight, as mine inn by the roadside— you take my meaning? And on you as the cheery landlord of— what shall we call it? The Stanton Arms."

A grin of satisfaction illumined Mr. Daniells' face.

"That's right, sir," he said briskly. "The

wife happens to have a good cut of mutton on the roasting jack today. 'Piéce de resistance', as Sir Jasper called the joint. And trimmings, of course. You will be just in the nick, as the saying goes. Meanwhile, sir, allow me."

And herewith the butler took possession of the portmanteau.

"Three good miles it is, from the cross- ways," he remarked feelingly. "A good three miles to carry your own bag. It's only a quarter of an hour's walk, by the short-cut, to the hall. Over the stile, sir."

Hoisting the package on his shoulder, he stepped a pace aside and respectfully indi- dicated the way. The young man per¬ mitted the ministration with a nonchalance that raised him yet a point higher in the servant's estimation.

They took their road across the stubble fields, the traveler absorbed in thought, the butler, a pace or so behind, restrained, however regretfully, by long habits of defer¬ ence from intruding upon the silence. But as they reached the crest of the hill and, at a turn round the copse, the hall came into view afurlong away— one of those wonderful graystone manor-houses which are like gems set in the greening casket of Old World Wessex— the young man gave a subdued exclamation.

He halted a moment, both hands resting on his stick, to gaze upon the scene. A frown was upon his brow, and yet there was a kind of tender smile trembling on his lips. The emotion that had forced out the cry was not one that Mr. Daniells could rightly interpret, but it gave the man a welcome opening for renewed speech.

"Beautiful from here, isn't it, sir? I have sometimes wondered myself why they did not make the entrance to the park this way. Beautiful, I call it. But the avenue up to the hall— there, you see it on the left— ife fine, sir, very fine. People do say that Stanton is one of the most perfect manor- houses in all Dorset. I'm sure I think so myself. Pity, isn't it, when you have such a place, to stay so long away from it?"

"So long."

The young man spoke the words evenly. There was no inquiry in the tone; he seemed rather to be thinking aloud. But the talk¬ ative Mr. Daniells found in it sufficient en¬ couragement,and,as theyresumedtheirwalk, he delivered himself of information which he considered must in itself be of interest to the guest of chance, whilst it might to some extent justify the irregular behavior of a servant offering the hospitality of his absent master's house to a stranger picked up on the roadside.

"Oh yes, long! Seems long to me, sir."

It was now the fourth month since Sir Jasper, who up to that time had been leading his usual life, interested in his land, in his sport; entertaining a good deal in a bachelor way—"a widower, you must know, sir"— both his own neighbors and friends from town, had returned from a short absence abroad, oddly changed in his manner.

"Anxious, restless-like, if you know what I mean, sir. One moment one would have thought he was furious; another, that he was afraid— the queerest change, sir, as I have often said to many who came to inquire when Sir Jasper would be back. For it was the very next morning after his return that he went off again. He had never gone to bed! I was kept awake half the night, listening to him moving about the house. And he rang for me two hours before the usual time. He looked poorly— dreadful poorly— wanted his shaving-water, his boots at once and something— anything— to eat in his room. He who was always so very particular about a good breakfast. Thor¬ oughly upset, he was. The look, as the books say, of one haunted-"

"Haunted!" echoed the listener, and this time there was a ring in his voice.

The butler drew up level with him and, looking sideways at him, marked the sud¬ den excitement in the face, the new color that had mounted to the forehead, and felt flattered at having at last, as he considered, evoked interebt.

"Haunted?" repeated the traveler. "Haunted, did you say?" Then, as if catching himself up, "this is curious, Mr. Daniells— I caught your name right, didn't I? Interesting. Any reason that you could think of?"

"No, sir. As I said, Sir Jasper was unlike himself. No one had ever seen him nervous before. Angry, if you like— oh, angry enough— but never nervous. It was extraordinary. We all said so, in the servants' room, when he was gone. For, half an hour afterward, down he comes without a word to any one,  but looking black and scared. I helped him on with his greatcoat— it was a cold morning— and I felt something hard in his side pockets. I knew it was his pistols. And he selected his strongest stick. His face had a mighty odd grin on it. Then he went out— still without a word.

"I could not make anything of it all. And I stood at the front door, watching him go down the avenue quickly. And then I saw— I never would have believed it if I had not seen it myself— I saw him— him such a sportsman— give a jump at the sound of a gunshot! Swerve right across the road, he did, as if he had been shot himself— and yet it was only the keeper at the rabbits. Then he cut through the meadow into the copse. And that, sir, is the last I have seen of Sir Jasper— four months agone."

"Very strange," was the comment of the listener.

The Autumnal twilight was fast deepening. The house, as they drew near, loomed almost black against the faint sheen of the sky. A single yellow speck, lamp or candle flame, piercing through one ground- floor window emphasized the gloom of the place.

"And have you not heard from your master since?" he resumed, after a spell.

"Oh, we did get a letter. But that was as strange— to use your own word, sir— as the rest, considering he had gone away on a sudden idea, as one might say, without an ounce of luggage— with just his stick and his pistols. It came the next day, merely a bit of a note, from Salisbury. It's kept in my cash-box, but I can tell every word of it, having puzzled over it often and often. And it's short enough.

" 'Daniells,' it says, 'I am kept away on business. I can not say when I shall return. When I am able to come back, I shall let you know in good time. Meanwhile you are in charge at Stanton. I know I can trust you to look after my interests.' That was all, except the signature. You may believe, sir, that I keep that letter carefully. My credentials, in a manner of speaking."

The young man had a faint smile. The speaker certainly allowed himself some latitude in his interpretation of responsi¬ bility. Well, Mr. Daniells was in better luck than he deserved; he might have lighted upon a less eligible guest for pro¬ miscuous entertainment. Through the  darkness the servant could not mark the smile; he went on, as they now emerged from the side path upon the avenue:

"Yes, sir, that is all I know. And many a time I have had to tell the same to gentle¬ men neighbors who came to ask if we had any news. All I can say to them is that Sir Jasper is to let me hear in time when he means to come back. And 'twas all I could say to the servants who became out of hand and obstrolopous— if you'll excuse the word— there being nothing to do. And they began saying in their opinion Sir Jasper never would come back.

"Stanton, to be sure, was terrible dull, they said. And, besides, they said, it looked queer. And, one by one at first, then the rest all together— except Mr. Withall, the coachman— asked for their wages and took themselves ofi. Yes, dull enough it was, I must confess, sir. For Sir Jasper used to keep pleasant company. And I found it duller, as you may fancy, when it came to be left my lee-lone at the hall with Mrs. D., for she has not much talk in her, if you see what I mean.

"A good soul and capable, but her Bible and Fox's 'Martyrs' and her cupboards— that is mostly what she cares about. And Mr. Withall keeps to himself over the stables. The Choughs, that was a resource, in a manner of saying. And now that it's gone, you'll understand, sir, I spoke truth when I said it was dreary at Stanton."

They had arrived at the porch. Mr. DanieUs dropped the bag and rang the bell.

"I have the doors always locked, you see, sir, as in duty bound. But she won't be long."

As they waited on the steps, the young man asked carelessly—

"But did you never write to any of your master's relatives for news of him?"

"Why, sir, as a matter of fact, I didn't know of any one to apply to. I did consult the vicar, and he advised me to com¬ municate with Sir Jasper's lawyer."

"Ah," said the guest, in the darkness. "Of course. And— well?"

"I sent him a copy of my master's note. I told him about the servants and.asked his advice. He sent me some money, for we were running short— I having paid thewages myself— and he told me to keep exact accounts and wait, since it was clear, he said, as how Sir Jasper had left me in charge.

And that wag all. It's all right, Mrs. D., my dear. It's me and a gentleman." This, in a louder tone, to some one who could dimly be seen peering out of a side window.

"So, sir," said Mr. DanieUs, "if you wiU please step in, we shaU see what we can do for your entertainment. A gentleman, Mrs. D., who has to spend the night here," he went on, addressing an old lady of wrinkled and somewhat severe countenance, who had opened the door and stood in the haU, a large flat silver candlestick in her hand.

She raised her eyebrows.

"For the night, Daniells?"

"For the night, my dear," her lord re plied in a voice of placid command. "And that means a bed prepared— in the blue room, I think— and a fire. Then some supper on a comer of the dining-room table. You will understand, sir, that— fair is fair, as the saying goes— we can not at short notice have things done as if Sir Jasper were in residence. But it will be as good, I hope, as the Three Choughs. The poor Choughs," sighed Mr. Daniells.

"Now then, Mrs. D., bustle along," he cried, peremptorily, as the housekeeper, with dismayed countenance, still stood hesitating. "The gentleman is tired and hungry. And, whUe that's being done, sir, there is a fire in my office, if you don't mind waiting there."

He stopped, listening. The front door was still wide open; through the night air came the sound of hoofs and wheels on the hard ground of the avenue.

"Why, bless my wig," he said in a lower tone, "if there isn't a carriage coming up!"

2: The Watches Of The Night

THE stranger and the majordomo stared at each other; the same idea had struck them both. Mr. DanieUs, with dropping jaw, was scratching his cheek in perplexity. The irregular guest, however, seemed the more perturbed of the two; a heavy frown of annoyance darkened his face. The housekeeper was the first to speak.

"A carriage, at this hour— why this'll be the master at last!" she said and advanced to the door, just as the vehicle with a fine curve drew up by the porch. "Save us, no! Who, in the Lord's name can it be, Daniells?" she whispered, in awestruck amazement, looking over her shoulder at her husband and screening the light in her hand from a puff of wind.

The traveler alighted and, oddly painted on the darkness by a ray from the carriage lamp, stood giving directions to a servant in a foreign-looking livery, for the lifting down of sundry articles of luggage. He then turned round briskly and, with a clanking of spurs, came up the stone steps. At sight of him, the butler, who had pushed his way past his wife, gave an exclamation of surprized recognition— in which might have been detected a certain ring of relief.

"Ha, this is pleasant!" cried the new¬ comer in a voice of great heartiness. "This hospitable Stanton— the door wide open at the very sound of a traveler's wheels!" He spoke fluently, though with a perceptible outlandish accent. "I hope good Sir Jasper is well?"

"Sir Jasper— Captain?" said the major- domo, faltering. "Sir Jasper? Have you come on a visit, sir?"

"Yes, surely; he expects me, does he not?"

"Why, Captain Hanstedt, sir, Sir Jasper has been away since the end of May."

Blank dismay overspread the visitor's countenance.

"Away? Der Teufel!" he exclaimed. And when the servant had laid bare the state of resent affairs at Stanton, "Most singular," he went on. "Singular, most singular! Inexplicable. I must say. It was all arranged when I was here last— you remember, in March last— that when I returned to England in the Autumn, my first visit was to be with him, for the shooting. I wrote two days ago, to announce my coming on the fourth. What has happened— nothing bad I hope?"

Daniells took the candle from his wife's hand and brought its light over a heap of unopened letters on the hall table. The visitor bent down to look and turned one over with the end of his switch.

"There's mine," he said and pondered. Then straightening himself, "What's to be done, now? It's the deuce of a long drive back to Salisbury."

Here the other traveler, who, during the colloquy, had remained in the shadow, came back into the circle of light and remarked quietly:

"Well, Mr. Daniells, it really seems decreed that you are to dispense the hospitality of Sir Jasper's house to stranded wayfarers tonight."

The miltary gentleman looked up quickly, first at the speaker, who answered the look by a slight, very easy bow, and then in¬ quiringly at the butler.

"Ah, hum— yes," said the latter, betraying some confusion. "Rather funny, isn't it, Captain Hanstedt, sir? This gentleman, a friend of Sir Jasper—" and as he said this there was appeal in his side-flung glance—"this gentleman who— well, like yourself, sir, did not know— in fact, sir, he is going to spend the night here, too. I mean, like yourself, as we hope, sir, if you don't mind hasty accomodation. Yes sir, as I was saying, I am sure Sir Jasper would have wished it. Please to step this way, gentlemen. I'll send your carriage round to the stables, Captain. And the wife will see to the rooms."

The two strangers found themselves ushered into a morning room, the coldness of which was soon relieved by the lighting of a few candles and the crackling of a fire ready laid.

For a while there was a thoughtful silence. The captain stood before the hearth, legs apart in approved dragoon style. His companion sank into an armchair with equally self-possessed manner. And they took stock of each other.

They were much of an age; both in their middle twenties, perhaps twenty-eight; both men of good looks and of breeding, albeit in ways markedly contrasting. The captain's undress frogged coat and strapped trousers proclaimed the half-pay officer; his mustache heralded cavalry service. Brilliant, mobile, black eyes and white teeth which showed in flashes between very red smiling lips, gave a look of intense vital energy to a full-blooded countenance which otherwise was set in easy-going geniality, suggestive above all things of the hearty bon-vivant.

The other had the clear-cut, regular, rather impassive cast of features which belongs to the best type of English manhood— the gray eyes of the self-reliant, looking straight and direct, observant, without being searching; the set lips, firm, rather disdainful, the lips of one who thinks more than he talks, who at least had rather listen at any time than hear his own voice. It was the face of a man who is perhaps best satisfied with his surrounding when alone.

After a minute or two of mutual contemplation in a silence broken only by the crackling of the firewood, the military gentleman moved away from the hearth and, planting himself a pace in front of the armchair, clicking his spurred heels together in the true German style of ceremony, bowed.

"Sir," he began, "since our mutual friend, Sir Jasper, is so unfortunately absent, I introduce myself. Baron von Hanstedt, formerly captain in the Hanoverian hussars— the Death Hussars, Black Brunswickers, as you call them in England. Not your countryman, of course, but next door to it; we owe allegiance to the same king. Since the close of the late campaign an independent person traveling for my pleasure."

This was spoken roundly, and, though it had begun formally enough, it ended with an ingratiating look which obviously re¬ quested a similar confidence. The Englishman rose and returned the bow, if somewhat less elaborately.

H "DELIGHTED, I am sure," he made answer with a pleasant smile that altered his whole countenance; the odd foreign mixture of geniality and ceremoniousness in this chance acquaintance had taken his fancy. "And I, sir—" but here there was a second's hesitation—"my name is Alfred Fendall. Like yourself, as it seems, a traveler, but a traveling student; yes— that can be taken as a description of my pursuits in life. Just returned from what some people would call the grand tour — if it had not been prolonged for so many years and gone through without the wearisomeness of the usual bear-leader. I have had a very tiring day," he added half- apologetically, sinking down again into his armchair.

The other eyed him a moment with his broad smile; then, drawing a chair to the hearth, he stretched out his legs to the blaze.

"Now, this is pleasant! Very pleasant. There is no one whose company, I think, is so enjoyable as that of a traveled Englishman. I am in luck. For, in this curious accident, I was like to spend a rather tiresome evening— either to return to Salisbury behind a pair of tired horses, or to remain  solus and bored in a deserted house. I am grateful to fate— or I should rather say, if you will allow me, grateful to you, Mr.— Mr.?"

"Fendall."

"Ah yes, Mr. Fendall. Instead, I say, of solitude, which I hate. A meeting of friends. For do not the French have it, les amis de nos amis sont nos amis? And when I find myself, so to speak, your guest. It was your amiable suggestion to the butler. A friend of my old friend, Sir Jasper— why, a relative perhaps?"

The captain turned his head to look, with an engaging curiosity, at his companion.

"Yes— you are right. I may call myself a kind of relative. But I must decline any claim to the honor of being host at Stanton Manor. We are both guests here tonight. A quaint situation— guests of Mr. Daniells, the butler."

There was something in the tone with which this was said, courteous though it was, that discouraged further inquiry. The other, as a man of the world, forthwith accepted the hint.

"Quaint, as you say, my dear Mr. Fendall. A picturesque adventure: the soldier, the student, the deserted mansion— quite in the manner of our Musaeus. You know his work, no doubt. And it would be altogether delightful, were it not, in its way, alarming. What can be the mystery of Sir Jasper's absence, for mystery there seems to be? Have you any idea— do you know anything?"

"Nothing beyond what you heard yourself just now. Indeed, you would seem to have been more intimate with him, these last years at least, than I."

"Intimate? Well hardly that. He has shown me kindness; given me charming hospitality. Our actual acquaintance is not of long date. I must tell you that my father and he had been great friends in their young days, though I was unaware of the fact. When Sir Jasper met me in the hunting field last season and heard my name, he with the greatest hospitality invited me to make Stanton my quarters during the rest of the season— for old times' sake, as you say here. And, I must declare, a better host I never knew. It is quite impossible that he could have forgotten our arrangements for the Autumn."

The young man in the armchair remained silent, gazing pensively at the ceiling.

"I really think," resumed the ex-Brunswicker, after a musing pause, "that something ought to be done to find out what has happened to our friend— that good Sir Jasper!" He got up rather excitedly. "I wish— but I am myself hardly in a position to— but you, now, a relative; would you not think of making inquiries?"

"I certainly intend to do so," came the quiet answer. "In the ordinary course of things I should scarcely feel entitled to meddle in Sir Jasper's affairs. But these strange circumstances seem to justify inquiries at least. I shall go on to London tomorrow."

"Yes, that's right. His bankers, his man of affairs, any one you can think of— his doctor, perhaps, if you can find him. Of course, I would gladly devote some of my time to help. But— astranger, a foreigner— they would send me about my business. Do you know, Mr. Fendall, it relieves my mind greatly, this decision of yours? I am sure you will not mind letting me know of anything you may find out. I shall leave you my address in town.

"Well, I am relieved! Yes, I feel I can do better justice, now, to whatever cheer the butler may have to place before us in the name of his missing master. He has been giving himself considerable exercise on our behalf, judging by the echoes which resound from every quarter of this empty house, up-stairs and down-stairs— Yoicksl Here he comes!"

The speaker's joviality was here in strong contrast with the air of gravity with which he had referred to Sir Jasper.

When Mr. Daniells, rather red in the face, threw open the door with professional pomp and announced that supper was on the table, the soldier affectionately linked his arm to that of the student and marched with him into the dining-room, remarking in his rich guttural tones:

"So, my dear Mr.Fendall, procid atra cura, as we used to sing at Gottingen, my alma mater. For the nonce let us dismiss dull care. No use in anticipating tragedy— which after all may be but our fancy— is there? 'Pon honor, here is a recomforting sight at the end of a long day!"

Indeed Mr. Daniells had performed wonders. It was no mere corner of the table laid out for a snack; silver gleamed on the mahogany under the light of candelabra. The promised joint, flanked by the "trimmings," cunningly dished so as to pass muster in the eyes of goed-will as sepa¬ rate courses, supported by such cold viands as a ruthless ransacking of Mrs. D.'s larder could produce— the knuckle end of a gammon, a Blue Vinney cheese and so forth— now covered the board with more than sufficiency. The tankards were filled from the servants' hall cask of home-brewed; but topaz of sherry and ruby of port, glinting on the dresser, promised a congruous conclusion to a repast for the quality.

The Hanoverian took in the scene with a glance of appreciation. Having suggested by a courteous gesture that his new friend should undertake the carving, he himself, on the latter's equally courteous refusal, took up the honor of the table and went right willingly through the task. And he proved a notable trencherman; his voracious performance, after the manner of so many of his countrymen, interfered in no wise with the flow of conversation.

A BRILLIANT raconteur, he entertained his rather silent fellow guest — not to speak of the major-domo, for whom here was an even more welcome change in the dullness of times than he had hoped— with anecdotes of camp and court worthy of the fluent Gronow himself. Tales of student life— the high deeds of Kneipe and Mensur, the potting and dueling of the Gottingen good days, the brief, glorious career of the seven hundred noble Brunswickers, volunteers all, raised in mourning memory of the dead Duke William Augustus, the death of the leader in the Waterloo campaign— sundry personal feats and escapes of his own, relieved now and again by piquant allusions to adventures of galanterie during the late occupation of Paris by the allies— poured out from a seemingly inexhaustible fount.

"But come, my dear Fendall," he said at last, "what ails you? I can not help perceiving that you are not quite une bonne fourchetie as one might expect to find a man with such square shoulders. You shame my appetite— and my garrulity. Not one personal confidence of your own adventures! What ails you? You young Englishmen, traveled as you may be, are an oddly buttoned-up generation. Sir Jasper now, I'll warrant, would have capped one of my tales with some thrilling experience of his own young days— aye, and, pardi, of his later ones! Sir Jasper was good at a story, was he not, Daniells? Your name is Daniells, if I remember right?"

The butler paused in the act of removing the cloth, preparatory to placing the wine and walnuts on the mahogany.

"I do hope, Captain Hanstedt, sir," said he, as if brought back in the midst of his satisfaction to a sense of his present uncertainty, "that when you say 'was', it does not mean that you believe— it sounds dreadful, in a manner of speaking!"

"Nay, nay, my good Daniells, by 'was good' I only mean when we last met here. I have no doubt he is still as good and will be so when he does return. We have to thank you for a remarkably creditable feast, and I hope I may sometime or other have an opportunity to tell him how capitally you have acted in his name. And, while we drink his'wine, the next best thing to hearing him talk would be to hear about him. It may help us on our quest. For this gentleman, like me, means to institute inquiries about the mysterious disappearance— inquiries which, I must say, might well have begun sooner.

"But nunc est bibendum, Fendall; in other words, fill and pass the bottle! And I further propose this," went on the baron, growing perceptibly excited, "in which I am sure you will concur; namely, that Daniells here, being vice-host tonight, take a seat and have his wine with us. Informal, but picturesque and pleasant! And this evening's rencounter is nothing if not picturesque; don't you think so?"

The young Englishman, who had first received this suggestion with something of a patrician frown, checked himself and said, with a transient smile:

"No, Baron, not vice-host as you, an invited guest of Sir Jasper may call him, but to me host entire. Landlord, in fact; Mr. Daniells will remember the bargain I made with him. I am here a guest at what we agreed to call the Stanton Arms. But none the less indebted to him for service much appreciated," he added, as confusion again showed itself on the butler's face. "So we'll drink with him a bottle or two of his no doubt remarkable port, for the good of the house. Bring your chair round, Mr. Landlord!",

The words, pronounced in half-jocular, half-serious, but wholly gracious, manner, put the retainer at his ease once more and loosened a tongue that only professional decorum had held in restraint. There can be no doubt that Mr. Daniells, the disconsolate contemplator of the roadside ruin a few hours before, spent an evening more agreeable to his gregarious tastes than he had ever known, even on the best days of the Three Choughs.

But, however cleverly lured on by the captain, nothing came out which could throw any fresh light on the mystery of the squire's disappearance. And, after an hour's conviviality to which he, however, contributed scarcely more than the cracking of nuts and the pushing of the decanters along the polished wood, the guest of the portmanteau pleaded fatigue to the guest of the chaise and requested mine host, as he insisted on calling him, to show him his room.

When he had been duly installed in his apartment, made cheery enough by a wood fire, the young man drew an armchair by the hearth and lost himself in deep reverie.

For a while he could hear talk renewed in the dining-room below him, where his companion was, no doubt, discussing a fresh bottle with Sir Jasper's hospitable butler. But in time profound stillness settled upon the house. Yet the young man dreamed on, wide-eyed, while the flaming logs passed into red embers and then into a mere heap of white ash.

At last he roused himself and wearily prepared to turn into bed. But, as he tossed his coat upon a chair, under the impulse of a new thought he took up the candelabrum, the candles of which were already burned well nigh to the socket, opened the door and sallied into the passage.

Noiselessly, but without stealth, with all the decision of one well-acquainted with the place, he made his way to another room in the opposite wing of the house; and there, raising the light aloft,he stood a while gazing wistfully at the surroundings. It was a boudoir, obviously that of the late lady of the house, but still apparently kept up as one of the reception rooms.

A harp, with disused, curling strings, glinted pale golden in a comer. The white- paneled walls were covered with water- colors and pastels. Over the mantelpiece, however, hung a picture to which, after a moment, the night intruder drew near. It was the portrait of a young woman, painted in the manner of Romney, with a sad, rather weak, piteously tender face, a child on her lap and another playing at her knee.

His candles still held aloft, he gazed darkly for a long while. Presently something— perhaps a faint noise, perhaps that unmistakable feeling in silence and solitude of another living presence near— made him turn round sharply. The light fell upon a black figure framed in the white doorway. It was the Hanoverian, who was looking in with a smile that revealed the white row of teeth under the dark mustache— withshining eyes of singular expression.

The Englishman could not repress a start of anger; both the broadness of the grin and the fire of the eyes were more than the situation justified. Nevertheless, it was in a subdued voice that he said—

"So, it is you, Baron."

"And so it is you, Mr. Fendall," returned the other, deliberately stepping forward. "I heard some one pass my door— my room is in this passage— at a time when I thought everything was asleep in the house. I myself, somehow, am wakeful as the devil tonight— wine has at times that effect, and I had a fine whack of it! But you, so tired and all that? Do you know, as I watched you first prowling round the room, then petrified before that lady's picture, I thought you were sleep-walking. All my care was not to startle you. Perhaps you were, after all. That was a mighty jump you gave! Charming picture that, of the late Lady Ferrars," he went on, drawing nearer and peering knowingly at the portrait.

The other made no response for a moment. At last he said with an effort at airiness:

"Baron, let's leave it at that. I mean, that I was sleep-walking, you awoke me out of my trance, and thereafter we both wisely sought our beds. I do not know what time it is, but I shall have to depart somewhat early in the morning and therefore—"

"Right, my dear sir. Quite right. Indeed you look rather overdone," said the Brunswicker, thickly. And, before the parting at his own door, he insisted with effusion upon shaking hands.

3: A Leap In The Dark

"NOW,Landlord, I believe this will cover my shot. I'll not trouble you for a reckoning," said the young man, with a cheeriness perhaps a little forced, placing a guinea upon the table which Mr. Daniells was laying out for breakfast.

The majordomo pocketed the coin, smiling shamefacedly.

"Since you will have your little joke about landlords, sir. I am sure Sir Jasper—"

"Mr. Daniells, that will be a point to settle between you and Sir Jasper. It was your hospitality I enjoyed, not his. No doubt you can oblige me further— in the matter of a conveyance. Surely you can find something that will carry me and my bag as far as Blandford or Salisbury— any place where I can get coach for London."

"Salisbury?" The captain's voice rang hearty and guttural as he put in an appearance in the dining-room. "I am for Salisbury myself— London, too, for that matter, I hope— tonight. My dear sir, why not take your seat with me? Nay, nay, no ceremony! I have drawn blank at my old friend's; let me have in compensation a day in the company of my new one— if you will permit me so to call Mr. Fendall— of whom I have by no means seen as much as I would like. Yes? It must be yes. So— that is pleasant. Pray," turning to the major-domo, "warn the post boy and my servant to be round at ten with the chaise. That is settled," he went on, to bear down any remains of hesitation on the Englishman's part.

Thus it came to pass that, an hour later, the two guests of chance were bowling along the white road between the folds of the downs on their way to London together.

The last words of the captain to the majordomo, who, although generously tipped, bowed them disconsolately enough out of Stanton Manor, had been exuberantly optimistic:

"Tell Sir Jasper when he does return, as I trust he will soon, that I shall be in London till the fifteenth and that I hope to hear from him before that. I shall be at Long's Hotel, Bond Street."

Not content, however,with verbal instructions, he had with Teutonic thoroughnesstaken the precaution to hand the servant a slip of paper with the address and the date clearly written.

Then he had settled himself down with great show of comfort in his seat and selected a cigar from his traveling-case.

"Well, my dear Mr. Fendall," he began, between two puffs, "we are-"

"One moment, Baron," interrupted the young man. "Now that we are free of that excellent but rather foolish fellow's presence and that I am, as it seems, to pursue the pleasure of your acquaintance, it is necessary that I should clear myself at once of the discourtesy of sailing in your company under assumed colors."

The Hanoverian paused in his puffing, the tinder-box still poised in the air, and shot at his companion a smiling, inquisitive glance.

"My name is not Fendall, but Ferrars. The house in which we have spent the night is that of my father."

"So? Most interesting. Gad, this is indeed charming! Quite picturesque. Romantic— in the style of our Kotzebue's dramas. The wandering heir returning to the deserted ancestral mansion. Do you know, my dear sir, I had something of a vague idea, last night— some glimmering— as I saw you so pensive at the supper-table, gazing with a kind of melancholy abstraction at the old family pictures whilst I was rattling with my yams. Yes, and again in front of that delicious portrait— but pray, pray go on," he urged, as the other made a deprecating gesture.

"I have a rooted dislike to talking of myself and my own affairs," the Englishman resumed gravely. "You will, I am sure, forgive me if I only say just as much as will explain my presence in a house which I thought I would never enter again. And you will, I hope, excuse the deception to which I deemed it advisable to have recourse. You knew, possibly, that Sir Jasper had a son."

"I knew there was a son somewhere in the world. Yes. And I knew there was an estrangement, for, on making inquiries as to the heir of my friend's beautiful estate such as civility demanded, Sir Jasper gave me to understand it was a subject which he declined to enter upon. I gathered, however, that he knew absolutely nothing of your whereabouts and did not wish to know."

"Estrangement!" murmured Mr. Ferrars with bitterness. "I will not enter into details; it was one of those horrible tragedies that are only known to the son who has had to protect his mother against the cold cruelty of his father. She died of it at last— that sweet creature you found me gazing at. But enough of that. When she died, there rose between my father and me one of those quarrels which might easily end in murder.

"It did not so end, thank God! But it ended in my leaving the home of my people for ever— aye, and even the land of my birth, until yesterday— disinherited, of course, to the last shilling. All this is common knowledge in the county, and I have no scruple in speaking of it."

"Yes," said the Brunswicker with deep sympathy. "And, I may tell you now, I had heard as much."

"Then the subject is closed. Now, as to my return and my presence at Stanton under an assumed name. A letter reached me in France some days ago from the attorney who looks after my affairs over here — I mean the little money settled upon me from my mother's side, a modest pittance enough, on which, however, I am able to live— a letter telling me of the incomprehensible disappearance of my father.

"Stay— I may as well show it to you, though it throws little light upon the matter, because, oddly enough, there is in it a reference, perfectly mysterious to me, to that date which you mentioned just now to Daniells as that of your own departure. Here it is," he added, pulling out a paper from his pocketbook.

THE captain laid down his cigar, unfolded the sheet and read out under his voice:

Wapshot & Jones

Gray's Inn Square

Sept. 22nd, 1817.

Dear Mr. Ferrars—

We hope this may reach you without undue delay, wherever you may be. We send it to the last address known. This morning we had a call from Mr. Johnstone, of Johnstone & Mesurier, your father's attorneys, to inquire whether we were in position to communicate immediately with you. He appeared to be in some anxiety concerning Sir Jasper, who has not been heard of for a considerable time.

We were not able, of course, to give him any information; nor do we surmise that you would be more likely, given the circumstances, to do so. Mr. Johnstone, then, though in an informal manner, suggested that we should be acting in your interest if we could induce you— though for what reason he was not at liberty to say— to make sure to be in London some time before the fifteenth of October; and, indeed, not to fail to call at our office early on the morning of that date, when, should your father's absence be prolonged, your own presence at Messrs. Johnstone & Mesurier's office would be a matter of vital importance to you.

We think that the suggestion concerning your attendance here on the day mentioned, even if it should not lead to anything definite, is of sufficient moment to merit all your serious attention. We shall be, in any case, pleased to consider the matter with you at any time.

We remain, etc., etc.

"Singular," murmured the captain, after the perusal. Then, looking steadily into his traveling companion's eyes. "And you have no idea of the business to be transacted on the fifteenth?"

"Not the remotest," answered Ferrars, taking back the letter. "But, so long as I am fully assured that I shall not be brought face to face with my father, I shall of course attend if called upon."

The other fell back into his seat and resumed his cigar, musingly.

"That letter," pursued Ferrars, "reached me three days ago in Normandy. I was near Cherbourg. On inquiring about any boat likely to sail for England, I heard of one bound for Poole. It gave me the idea of passing through Dorset on my way to London and finding out discreetly, for myself, what was known of my father's movements. I meant to take my quarters last night at a certain little inn near Stanton, where the people and I had been on a friendly footing in the old days.

"It turned out the inn was no longer there. The rest you heard: how that fellow Daniells, my father's present butler— the old one whom I remembered from a child left when my mother died— so whimsically offered me hospitality in what had been and ought still to be my own home. And now you will understand how, being discovered there in such irregular circumstances by a friend of Sir Jasper, I thought it wiser, both for Daniells' sake and for my own, to give the first name that suggested itself as fitting the initials on my portmanteau. No further apology is needed, I trust?" he added, marking, with a slight frown, the abstraction into which his companion seemed to have fallen.

"Ah, non certes!" cried the other, starting from his reverie. "Forgive my French— I am apt to think in different languages, though by rights it ought always to be in German. No, no; the whole thing about this bizarre meeting of ours, is quite clear. Clear as crystal. My dear Mr. Ferrars, I am a friend of your father's— I know you will not expect me to pass any judgment on him. But I trust you will allow me the pleasure of shaking hands, knowingly now, with his son."

The ceremony being performed, with great cordiality on the foreigner's part and indulgent compliance on that of the Englishman, the subject of family affairs was by tacit accord dropped for the rest of the journey. Dinner at the Black Horse, Salisbury, a pint of Madeira at the Fleur-de-Lys, Winchester, a quart of old ale and biscuits at the White Hart, Bagshot, broke the ten hours of steady posting which brought them at last to town.

"Where, by the way, shall I deposit you?" had asked the captain, as a kind of conclusion to a prolonged spell of meditation, as they crossed Kingston Bridge. "I have my own quarters at Long's. But, unless you have bespoken a room there, I doubt—"

Mr. Ferrars had thought to detect a hint and answered:

"I used to patronize the Piazza Hotel, in Covent Garden. If you don't mind going a trifle out of your way."

"The Piazza, by all means, my dear sir." And leaning out of the chaise the baron had given the order to the post-boy.

When they parted under the ancient dimly-lit arcades of Inigo Jones, at the door of the hostelry so dear to the wit and fashion of the late century, now wearing into respectable decadence, the Brunswicker remarked at his most genial:

"Let me hope, my dear Mr. Ferrars, that we are gens de revue, as the French have it. I, myself, have much to do, and, as for you, tomorrow will doubtless prove a busy day. But you conceive my interest. May I not come and— say, smoke a cigar with you in the evening and hear what fortune you have met with in your inquiries?"

Mr. Ferrars pondered a moment.

"If you will partake of a quiet dinner with me, I shall be delighted. I have no great hopes, being, as you know, so trammeled. But we may consult. And, meanwhile, I remain greatly obliged to you."

AT SEVEN on the following day Baron von Hanstedt was ushered into the dining-room of the Piazza— a notable dandy, whose brilliant appearance and manner distinctly raised the modest visitor of the small valise in the manager's estimation.

"I will not conceal my anxiety," he said, from the moment of unfolding his napkin as they sat down in a remote corner of the somber dining-room. "Any news of Sir Jasper?"

"None that would appear to bring us nearer a solution of the mystery," said the son in a tone of some weariness. "The only satisfactory thing I was able to find out is that there is, after all, reason to believe that my father's prolonged absence is not necessarily the result of any fatal accident."

"Aha— so?" The baron paused, with his glass half-way to his lips. There was a glint of intense interest in his eye. He added promptly, "Well, that is at least a comfort. A great comfort. But the reason, the welcome reason—"

"I called at the bank. The manager, naturally enough, was disinclined to reveal anything concerning a customer's affairs. But, on my urging the anxiety I felt that there might be some sinister meaning to that total disappearance, he consented to reassure me by saying that the absence was presumably intentional. For it appears that in May last, the date mentioned by Daniells, Sir Jasper had hurriedly called at the bank and drawn a considerable sum. And this might well look, said the manager, as if he had contemplated a prolonged absence, a journey, perhaps. And then, as I still felt doubtful, he advised me to dismiss all serious anxiety at least until the fifteenth."

"Ah, bah! The fifteenth again," murmured the Brunswicker, sipping his wine with half-closed eyes.

"For," went on the Englishman, "that was a date on which Sir Jasper's attendance at the bank would be a matter of importance. But, if he was not heard of by that time, there might indeed be cause for some alarm. Then, the manager said, advice might with propriety be sought from Bow Street. But he confidently trusted that would not be required."

"Bow Street? Gad, no, no; let us also trust there will be no need— and is that all?"

"That is all. For Mr. Wapshot, on whom I had called previously, had no more to tell than what was mentioned in his letter. Nor could I gather anything from Mr. Johnstone— my father's own lawyer— whom I thought it wiser also to visit. He seemed, it is true, rather concerned; but he pointed out, rightly enough, that, considering the peculiar relation in which I stood now with his client, he was not at liberty to discuss his affairs and movements with me. Nevertheless, when, after a very brief interview, I was taking my departure, he reminded me, though with some hesitation, of the advisability of my being within reach of summons on the morning of the fifteenth."

"The fifteenth," repeated von Hanstedt with an air of intense mystification. "A red-letter day, it would seem, in Sir Jasper's diary! Well, I see nothing for either you or me to do than to wait for that fifteenth."

"There is, of course, the alternative of applying at once to Bow Street. In fact I had almost made up my mind to go there in the morning."

The other looked up quickly with an air of grave concern.

"So? Well, you are the son. I am, at best, but a new friend. I would not take on myself to advise. But isn't there an old saw about thrusting fingers between the bark and the tree? The banker and this Mr. Johnstone, sound men of business, they both suggested waiting for a few days. I think— yes, I think their opinion is reassuring. Once set the Bow Street Red-breasts on the run and God knows where they may lead you!

"Perhaps face to face with a man full of ill-feeling against his son— a man furious, possibly, to find himself run down when his purpose, only known to himself, was to be left alone till a certain date. However, as I said, it is not for me to advise."

And with his man-of-the-world air, the air of one who knows the right moment to drop a topic, the, baron led the talk into new channels. When he took his leave at a discreetly early hour, he remarked in a tone of affectionate interest:

"We shall, I fear, not meet again for some time. I am much engaged. But a note, should you have occasion, sent to Long's, will always reach me. Should you have any news, I need scarce say how interested I shall be."

This might be interpreted as a polite farewell. Mr. Ferrars, at any rate, when he returned to his table, after escorting his guest to the door under the arcades, and, toying with a final glass of wine, gave himself up to doubtful meditations upon his future course, came to the conclusion that he had seen the last of Baron von Hanstedt.

THE next morning, however, brought a prompt denial to that rash conclusion. After a night of uneasy wakefulness he was aroused from a late slumber by the entrance of a waiter:

"Begging your pardon, sir," said the man, "there is a gentleman here, who says he must see you at once. Most important he says. And though I told him—"

A lusty voice was heard from the passage.

"Never mind; I will explain. May I come in, Mr. Ferrars?" And, without waiting for the permission, the baron strode in with the well-known click of spurs. "The matter is one of such moment, I know you will forgive this rude intrusion."

He gave an imperious nod to the waiter, who, after leering curiously at the gentleman caught still abed, obediently departed— firmly convinced that here was a coming instance of pistols for two that day.

"The fact is, my dear sir," went on the visitor, "I have the most extraordinary news."

"For me?" said Ferrars, with no great display of interest.

In truth, in his still drowsy state what he chiefly felt was resentment. He sat up, bare legs dangling over the bedside, and perfunctorily indicated a chair. The baron, however, remained standing, his attitude manifesting an evident state of excitement.

"For you," he said, pulling out some papers from his breast pocket. "This disappearance of your father—"

"Ah, my father still."

"Yes— there is after all a mystery about it. But I think we are near solving it."

"We, Baron?"

"We, I said; but it will rather be you, or so I hope. And I am thankful I was able to find you in time, for the matter appears pressing. Very pressing. Now listen— or rather, read this first. It is from the butler at Stanton. I found it last night at my hotel."

The young man took an ill-scrawled sheet and read:

Captain Hansted,

honored sir—

I forward a letter which arrived here almost as soon as you had left. As it is marked urgent, I took it at once to the post-office, and I trust it will reach your hand in good time. It was luck, in a respectful manner of speaking, that you thought of leaving your address. Your obedient servant,

W. Daniells.

He handed back the note and took an¬ other that was held out to him. It was penned in a slender foreign hand. And this is what he read, in French:

My good friend—

I want help badly and soon and you are the only one of whom I can think in my extremity. I am ill, very ill. I am detained in some place unknown to me— all I do know is that it is somewhere near Versailles— sequestered by people also unknown to me. What their purpose may be, I can only guess— and that is to prevent me being in London on the fifteenth, a day of much importance to me; if indeed they mean to let me out of this place alive.

But I, somehow, am in fear they mean to do me to death after all. A natural death it may seem, but it will be murder. Murder, if some one does not come to my help! I have, through God's mercy, found a secret friend in my nurse— for they pretend to nurse me. But she also is helpless and terrorized. She writes this for me; I am too weak, and almost blind. It is horrible. I bethought myself of you and remembered you might be found at Stan-

Pray God this may reach you, and, for the love of heaven, come at once to Versailles! Show yourself near the north confessional in the Church of Saint Louis any day at first mass; she will know you. And, at any rate, you will know her by her blue linen dress and the gray veil over her head. She will tell you the house. Then you must act, as best you may devise, to get me out of this living tomb. Come at once, and may you find me still alive.

The letter was signed in another hand, larger and trembling. The young man looked up in blank dismay.

"Yes," he said in a low voice, "this is my father's signature. And, after examining it again for a spell, "He was indeed in a weak state when he signed this. What is to be done? What will you do—"

"What would I do," said the baron excitedly, "if I were free— but I am not. Why, post to Paris at once, obtain police aid, meet the messenger, find out thehouse— and the rest à la grâce de Dieu! My poor old friend! But it is quite impossible for me to leave England just now. I have business of too great importance. I was in despair. Then I thought of you. You, his son, singularly met by Providential chance. His son, for all your estrangement, you are here; you will— you must— act in my stead. You will have even more power than a stranger.

"There is no time to spare. Nay, listen to me— and let me urge you to dress, as quickly as you can. I shall, if you will allow me, even serve with a valet. Yes, I have thought the whole matter out. I called on my way here at the Golden Cross. The Dover coach had already left, but it can still be done by posting. I ascertained that the packet leaves harbor at six in the morning. Let me ring for your shaving-water. Yes, here is the bell. So. By posting, I say; I have ordered a chaise for eleven.

"With good luck you can be in Dover before midnight. Then for Calais— and without a stop to Paris. And my servant will see to everything for you; I have warned him, just as for myself— a clever fellow, a Frenchman and knows Paris. Within forty-eight hours you shall alight at the Bureau de la Sûreté, take chief of police's sanction— and act. Act without loss of an hour! Already a day has been wasted.

"As for expense— it will be a trifle to what

I should lose by absenting myself— you will, of course, let me discharge that. You need not scruple; if, as I hope to God, we rescue Sir Jasper, he will repay the debt. Here are the traveling funds."

He produced a bundle of bank-notes which he slapped upon the table.

"Should you require more, you can write to me. You see I have thought of everything. You have your passports?"

While the Brunswicker rattled on sanguine, voluble, Ferrars— awake now with a vengeance— flung the letter on the table and sprang out of bed; he submitted to his friend's ministrations, in non-committal silence.

"My father, in truth, was in dire state when he wrote his name after that mysterious message. Something must be done. I have no doubt," he said, as he accepted the razor which the other had been stropping for him, "that Sir Jasper would rather remain indebted to you than to me for his rescue— if it is to prove a rescue. Did you not yourself advise me against intermeddling?"

"Nay, nay. This is an appeal, a piteous appeal. It must be answered. I am tied here, as I told you, and you are your own master. And, whatever has happened between you, in such a case as this, you, the son, can not refuse."

"I will go," said Ferrars quietly.

At which the baron gave a noisy sigh of relief.

The young man completed his toilet and packed his valise, listening without further comment to suggestions and advice about his journey. At last he took up the notes, counted them and consigned them, together with the letter, to his wallet.

"I will account for this on my return," he said simply. "Without it I could scarce have left this day."

"Ah, my dear fellow, never mind such details. The journey is for you a labor of duty. As for me, I can not tell you what a relief it is— a service for which, happen what may, I shall ever be grateful."

4: The Forest Of Montmorency

"DOUBT indulged," as one learned in life's philosophy has written, "soon becomes doubt realized." It was during the last stage but one on the weary, bone-shaking, paved route royale from Calais to Paris that lowering doubt first arose like a cloud on the fringe of Ferrars' meditation.

The mysterious nature of the errand upon which he had permitted himself to be jockeyed assumed suddenly a new color. It was an errand, whatever way he lookedat it, the issue of which was bound to be painful. Whether he failed altogether and came too late to prevent the mischief, or he succeeded, only to be brought into renewed relations that were intolerable to him; whether his father proved grateful, and through gratitude inclined to reconciliation— or— which was quite as likely— sullen in suppressed resentment, the meeting could only bring renewed bitterness.

But now, from one moment to the other, a strange sense of distrust— as if it were the sudden coalescence of many vague, elusive suspicions— encompassed him like some kind of intangible net. The fifteenth— what was it that hinged on that date which loomed at all points of the compass in this tenebrous affair? All at once a conviction asserted itself that the transaction of that day, whatever it might be, was as well known to the plausible baron as to Johnstone the attorney— aye, as to Sir Jasper himself. Stay— from the advice he had received, it might be quite as important to Sir Jasper's son to be in London on that day. And yet he was flying on God knew what bootless chase.

"By George," thought Ferrars, "sent out of the way! But that letter?"

He pulled the sheet out of the wallet. Many a time, pondering over the incomprehensible affair which had hurled him upon his travels, had he conned it impatiently, in despair of ever fitting an acceptable expla¬ nation to it. But never before had it occurred to him to note that the address flap had been tom off the sheet. What proof was there— and at the thought he sat up rigidly in the jolting chaise— that it really came from France?

"You will, of course, show it to the Chef de la Sûreté," the baron had said, as he had closed the carriage door at the start of this hustled journey. Was that a blind? What proof that the letter really came from Sir Jasper? The handwriting of a long letter can scarce be forged— but a mere signature ....

He looked at it again by the waning light. Yes— it was Sir Jasper's characteristic way of signing. And the rather uncertain tracing of some letters might be accounted for by the feebleness of a sick man, his alleged impaired eyesight— unless both the message and the signature were alike a fraud. Why, how well might the whole affair be a fraud! A plot. A clever plot, boldly devised, to send out of the way some inconvenient witness. Witness of what? There was no clue to that. But he had literally been jockeyed out of England— hustled away with a plausible tale. Plausible?

Nay; a palpable cock-and-bull story, a manifest rigamarole, that ought not to have taken in the veriest tyro in life's arena! And Ferrars was no tyro. But he had been blinded by the appeal to filial sacrifice— and never allowed an hour to think, to weigh. Hustled— aye, and duly shepherded! That servant, too, provided so obligingly, so pat, by the unknown baron— that Jacques, that smiling, well-mannered Jacques, who had looked so attentively after Ins charge....

Now, thinking of it from a new standpoint, Jacques' face and manner, his voice especially, were hardly convincing. But, if not a servant, what?

It came back to Ferrars' puzzled mind that at Beaumont, the last posting change they had left, Jacques had seemed to be on odd terms of acquaintance with one of the postilions in waiting. He had insisted upon this particular man undertaking the last stage. There might be nothing in that, and again there might be— what? The traveler leaned forward to have a look through the front port-hole of the chaise at the countenance of the driver.

But dusk had gathered. And in the shadow of the Montmorency Forest, which the road was then skirting, all that could be seen was the outline of the two men with heads drawn together, apparently engaged in close confabulation. Presently Jacques rose to his feet on the box and turned round, as if to survey the road in the rear.

There is no saying what trifling gesture or word in one already suspected may be sufficient to reveal a sinister purpose. Something in the nod which after a moment the man gave to his companion brought a conviction to Ferrars that mischief was afoot. Instinctively he groped for and seized his sword-stick, a weapon upon which in his continental travels he had learned to rely. And, indeed, almost on the instant the mischief he had so inexplicably anticipated was about him.

It came with such bewildering rapidity that it was only some considerable time later that he was able to connect in their proper sequence the things he saw, what befell him and what he himself did during the next few seconds.

THE chaise was suddenly pulled up. Amid shouts and curses from the two men outside the horses fell to frantic plunging and kicking. He was thrown off his seat. Before, in the confined space, he could straighten himself again, the door was torn open, and Jacques was dragging him out with fierce, unsparing hands and wild words of abjuration:

"Quick, sir! Quick— come away! The horses are mad. Not a second! He can not hold them another moment!"

Recovering his feet on the roadway, having been wrenched rather than helped out of the rocking chaise, the traveler could indeed, through the gloom, see the post-boy— who, like the other, had escaped from the box— straining, almost doubled up, at the long reins.

"He's out!" cried Jacques from behind.

On the words the other let go the reins and then did an unimaginable thing; he picked up the whip and furiously lashed at the horses, which, now released, leaped forward, almost overturning the carriage, still pur¬ sued into the darkness by the relentless flogging.

Ferrars, though dazed, turned round, im¬ pelled by a sense that the danger was now behind him— only just in time to avoid, by a swift instinctive jerk aside, the full force of a blow the nature of which he could not realize. It might have been the clawing of a panther but for its extraordinary weight— such a weight that, had it taken him on the forehead, it would infallibly have felled him to the ground.

As it was, it only tore his cheek and mercifully fell short of his shoulder. Something loose and dangling was in his assailant's hand. As it was savagely raised for a new crash, the young man, not inexpert in the arts of fight, sprang a pace sideways; out flashed the blade from the stick and swift, unerring even in the murk, whipped clean through the neck of Jacques the unknown.

The stricken man stopped short, his arm still uplifted; the weapon fell from his hand with an odd clatter on the ground. He swayed once or twice where he stood; then, withafumblingmotion, he drew from his side pocket something which bright silver mountings revealed as a pistol. But before, painfully striving, he could raise the flint, he swayed again. Rigid, like a falling post, dropped on his face and remained still.

The sound of the horses' gallop, the rattling of the chaise on the paving-stones, had ceased. For a few moments there was rofound silence on the deserted road, roken only by the soughing of the wind amid the topmost branches. Ferrars stood motionless, his blade still poised against at¬ tack, striving to put some order in his ideas. He had killed a man, and that was a sickening sensation.

Presently came the sound of hurried footsteps, and it recalled him to a sense of peril still at hand. On an impulse he knelt by the figure on the ground, took up the pistol from the inert hand and cocked it. He had just succeeded in withdrawing another from the dead man's pocket when the footsteps stopped a few paces behind him. From the darkness, a voice— one of those horrible voices, husky dull and trailing, so peculiar to the French of the lowest class— called out, halting from want of breath, yet exultant:

"All in order, mon Capitaine. A number- one success, thunder! Horses in the ditch, carriage smashed to cinnamon, la la! And our Angliche stiffened to rights. I see. Ah! Bah, what is it? Aren't you pleased? A well-conditioned, first-class carriage accident, I call it. My job, though, was sacredly the more difficult."

The post-boy came a step nearer, bending down to peer.

"Got the pocketbook? Pity we must leave the flimsy. Well, well, the farce is played."

He gave a contented gurgle, which suddenly passed into a cry of surprize. The Englishman had risen to his feet and thrust the muzzle of his pistol into the ruffian's throat.

"Farce, brigand? I'll have it out with you at least! What is the game? Come, speak out if you have no taste for lead!"

But the other, with an exclamation of furious disappointment—"Raté! Coup raté, nom de Dieu!"— lashed out a kick which all but broke his captor's leg, wrenched himself free and bolted into the darkness of the wood. Raging, Ferrars sent a ball after him. A yell of angry pain told that luck had guided the flying shot. But that the scoundrel had only been winged was made clear by the sound, continued for a while, of his retreat through the crackling dead wood.

The young man passed his hand over his face; itwas streaming with blood. He tried to take a step, but his injured knee gave way under him. As he crawled upon the ground, seeking some place against which he might rest, he passed the body of his unknown enemy, and the something white and limp that had dealt him so fearsome a blow caught his eye. He picked it up: a napkin, tied into a bag, filled with broken sharp-edged flints.

And now he understood. Death from such a tool or death from a fall upon the jagged stones of the causeway— the wounds wouldbe the same. To minds unsuspicious— and why should there be suspicion— here had been nought but a fatal leap from a runaway carriage. Valet and postillion, thrown and shaken, but mercifully preserved. He saw it all with mind now singu¬ larly lucid.

"A well-conditioned accident," and— but for God's mercy, "a number-one success!" No murder, no robbery: "pity we must leave the flimsy." But then, why seek for the pocketbook? Ah, of course! The decoy letter. Englishman traveling for private purposes, killed in an accident. The decoy letter abstracted, but passport and other identifying pieces left. Walter Ferrars safely out of the way.

Nevertheless the mystery remained as closely veiled as ever. And it mingled now with that of Sir Jasper's disappearance, with that of the fantastic meeting at Stanton. Why was he to be put out of the way?

FOR a long while, propped against a a milestone by the roadside, his pistol at hand— against the quite conceivable event of an attempt to make good the coup raté, the botched job— he grappled with the riddle. His brain was quite clear, though his hurts ached cruelly. But he could find no solution; he could come to no fresh surmise, save the horrifying one that Sir Jasper might well have already met with some similar fate to that so cleverly devised for the elimination of his son. And now, there were his own present affairs to consider. He had killed a man, and, whatever the issue might prove, there was no doubt immediate trouble ahead.

The highroads of France, busy enough by day, are at night strangely deserted. Of foot-passengers there were none; the purlieus of the forest of Montmorency had no good reputation for security. And of vehicles, an hour passed before the first made its appearance: a roulier's wagon. Unable to rise, Ferrars called out. But the roulier, after the custom of his tribe, was fast asleep; the horses, sagacious beasts, kept to the right side from long habit. The heavy machine rumbled by, unheeding.

The next to pass, half an hour later, was a fast-trotting carriole, which, on being hailed, simply hurried along at a faster rate, suggestive of fright. A few minutes later, however, it could be heard coming back.

"Was that your carriage, capsized over there by the bridge?" the driver sang out, pulling up.

"Yes. Are you the man I hailed?"

"Ah— I thought it might be a night-bird's trick. They pretend to be hurt, and, when one comes near— a bludgeon on the head, like as not! One knows a thing or two in Montmorency. But that carriage— it's different. What can one do for you? A lift?"

Ferrars had settled on his course.

"No— thank you. I must keep watch here on a dead man."

"Dead man? Cristi!"

"What you can do for me, is to fetch the gendarmes. A louis d'or for you, if you come back with them and with your carriole to take the body and me, for I can't walk. Here, my friend, six francs of earnest money."

The heavy coin rang on the pavement. The man jumped down, groped for a moment and, having found the faintly gleaming six-piece:

"At your service, milor. I say that, you know, because you speak like an Englishman. Shall I tell them—"

"Tell them," interrupted Ferrars with impatience, "that an Englishman has killed a man and waits for them to come. That's all."

"Cristi!" said the peasant again, mounted and hurried away.

Another hour elapsed, in the silent solitary vigil; in the blackness of

the forest huge

Incult, robust and tall, by nature's hand

Planted of old,

before the carriole returned, escorted by two mounted gendarmes.

"It's here," shouted Ferrars from his milestone.

One of the gendarmes dismounted, heavy- booted, rattlingwith spurs and saber; he took up a lantern from the carriage and threw its fight upon the blood-smeared face.

"That is the man— over there," said Ferrars calmly. "These are his own pistols. The sword-stick is mine. My other belongings are in the carriage. Now, if you will be so good as to help me into the cart, I shall be glad to be brought to the authorities."

5: The Spanish Lady And The Bibliophile

"WHATEVER poet or sage may say, old age is still old age."

Such was the unexpectedly rueful conclusion of one who was both poet and sage himself, who had, indeed, many a winning thing to say upon the placid beauties of life's Autumn.

In the estimation of that genial bibliophile, M. Havart de Gournay however, Autumn was no symbol for "old age." Winter, yes, of course; but Autumn, ah no. Autumn was only the hour of maturity, of fruition. For the serene, epicurean philosopher, in the words of one of his favorite authors—

Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plains

Comes jovial on!

The Winter solstice in man— in a man of health and honored ease— might be said to occur at the passing of three score years and ten— perhaps. Now, M. Havart de Gournay, upon this eighth day of October, 1817, had only entered upon the sixty-first year of a life which, for all it had seen momentous upheavals, strange vicissitudes in his country's fortunes, had been evenly prosperous. Indeed, but for the looming of the Winter toward which Autumn undeniably drifts, this amiable gentleman could argue that the seventh decade was in many ways the most satisfactory of the whole span noted of the psalmist.

Unalloyed enjoyment is so rare in this world that it may without rashness be asserted that no one was more content with life than M. de Gournay as he sat by his balconied window, all in the glow of a fine sunset, examining a new bibliographic treasure just come into his possession.

His was one of those admirable houses, dating from the Grand Siècle, on the Quai Malaquais, overlooking across the silvery Seine the noble prospect of Louvre and Tuileries. Behind it, stretching as far as the Rue de Bourbon, spread the old mulberry-tree gardens of the whilom Theatins convent. The mansion, not inconveniently vast, but of perfect appointment, was ruled by a dame in her still handsome forties, reasonably plump, serene-tempered, withal witty— rare and delighting combination— who still thought the world of her old husband. She kept him in health and cheeriness with the help of an admirable chef and rejoiced in his bookish hobby, which left her free to enjoy the social intercourse for which he had but little taste.

The passion which had outlived all others in M. de Gournay's life was wholly bibliomaniac. And his collection of rare bindings— of volumes, incunabula and others, with fine printers' devices of livres à vignettes and armorial stamps— was a thing which no doubt when it came to the hammer— ultimate fate of all collections: Nunc mihi, mox aliis— would make the hearts of future bibliophiles leap with eagerness.

"Tell me whom thou consortest with; I will tell thee who thou art." To say that his best appreciated correspondent was Thomas Frognall Dibden, Esq., a friend of exile days in England, then engaged upon the "Bibliographical Decameron;" to say that one of the most welcome presences at his dinner-table was that of M. Brillat- Savarin, the witty gourmet then meditating his immortal work on "La Physiologie du Gout;" that perhaps would be the quickest way of limning the mental man in M. de Gournay.

The bodily presentment was equally engaging. Short, fresh and neat; always attired point-device in an old-fashioned style— slightly powdered hair in a queue; silver shoe-buckles and so forth, in men of his age quite de mise under the returned Bourbons; with a good appetite, sound teeth and clear eyes, M. de Gournay was the very image of one equipped for the enjoyment of fife, especially in its Autumn. When M. Brillat-Savarin rallied him on the coming of an appreciable rotundity, he would answer, with a kind of smiling ruefulness that had nothing bitter in it:

"Bah, my good friend, let that be! Shall we not all of us be thin enough— some day?"

And he would add a "dum vivimus, vivamus;" a "carpe diem," or some such comforting tag dear to the bon-vivant.

If it be further mentioned that the heir to this fortunate house, a youth of attain¬ ments, idolized by his father, was rapidly making for himself a brilliant position without losing a loving devotion to his family— a characteristic very particularly French— it will have been made plain that M. Havart de Gournay had the right to be pleased with life.

At the sunset hour of this particular day the excellent gentleman was gloating over a vellum-bound volume, armoried in faded gold, that displayed— greatest of rarities— the printer's device of Valentin Fernandez. He was inhaling the fragrance of an undreamed prize and licking the chops of greedy anticipation at the thought of many more that might, it appeared, be in his grasp on the morrow.

Barely half an hour before an unknown visitor had secured a welcome by means of the most propitiatory of conceivable offerings— a little packet, under the strings of which was slipped a rather exotic glazed card, bearing beneath a slender Spanish coronet the name of Condesa Lucanor. A lady, the footman stated, requested the favor of a moment's interview with M. de Goumay. She would not detain him many minutes.

THE stranger's entrance had revealed a truly charming old lady, dressed in black silks of becoming— if undeniably foreign— elegance. Bandeaux of white hair, under a fall of black lace, framed a visage of gray, faded beauty, still lit up by eyes of marked brilliancy. She was enveloped in a delicate atmosphere of Parma violets. Her manner, which had withal the ease of une dame du monde, was self-assured, even to briskness.

"If M. de Goumay, the well-known con¬ noisseur, will undo this parcel," she had said as he led her to an armchair, "he will save me the difficulty of any preamble and will understand the object of my intrusion."

She spoke the purest French, but with a vibrating, deep Castilian voice that was most attractive.

He had bowed and obeyed. Then, radiantly:

"A Fernandez! Of 1501! Why, madame, this is a treasure! To what do I owe—"

"I will not waste your time," she had answered, with a smile singularly flashing in so wan a face. "I see that the introduction is sufficient for the present. And I feel, now, confident that it will lead to a transaction that may be very pleasant to you— while it will extricate me out of a difficulty. I possess, at my villa in St. Mandé— I have written the address on the card— a collection of books left me by my late husband. I have always understood, although these are not things I understand, that it is a remarkable one. This volume I took haphazard. The binding pleased me. It has, you see, the arms of Lucanor on the side—"

"Are these Lucanor?" had exclaimed the greedy collector in ravishment.

"Yes," had pursued the dame, in pleasant but businesslike tones. "And there are a good many others; the best houses of Castile. I am a lone woman; I have no use for all these vieilleries. But, to be frank, I have much use for their worth. I must leave France in something of a hurry, and I require money. I made inquiries. I heard that M. de Gournay collected such things; that he was a man of wealth. In fact— you see I am quite open— I thought that I could get a better price, leaving it to you, a gentilhomme, to fix it, than by going to the librarians. You can have the pick; the rest can then go to them. Ah, I see you will. I am fortunate. And so are you— permit me to say so."

After a little more converse at a similar lively rate, the lady had taken her departure.

"Time," she had urged, as he escorted her back to her fiacre, "is for me very pressing. I have a world of things to see to. But I shall be in between eleven and twelve for you and have the treasures," she laughed charmingly; "these old bouquins, with not a line in them that any one can care to read, are jewels for your bibliophiles, it seems— I'll have all the treasures laid out for you. Yet, be punctual— eleven to twelve is all I can give you. Five minutes past eleven, and I shall conclude you have thought better of it. Then," she threatened him with her fan, "the librarian of St. Genevieve will have first pick."

"Be assured," had said the jubilant collector, "I shall be there at the first stroke."

"By Saint Alipantin—" the absurd asseveration the bibliomaniac favored in his moments of melting blandness—"by Saint Alipantin," murmured M. de Goumay, as all in the sunset glow he collated the black-letter leaves, "no, I am scarce likely to be late!"

And, little conscious indeed of the direction in which the stream of his placid life had been diverted by this pleasant whirlwind, he counted the hours that still separated him from the fateful morrow.

AMONG the letters awaiting M. de Gournay upon his breakfast tray— madame took her early chocolate amid her own pillows— was one from Lon¬ don, which the gentleman, attired this morning not in slippers and quilted silk dressing-gown but already prepared to sally forth though it was scarce past eight o'clock, took up with some curiosity.

The contents proved of growing interest, for he read right through without thinking of lifting the coffee-pot which his fingers had mechanically sought. These words Mr. Johnstone had written from Bedford Row:

Dear M. de Gournay—

In view of the near approach of the fifteenth of October, when the tontine scheme of which the management is in our hands comes to maturity, I take upon myself to remind you of the vital importance of your, or your son's, presence in propria persona at our office upon that day and not later by any means than twelve o'clock, noon, Greenwich mean time.

The terms of the document, you will remember, are exacting; positively beyond evasion. Personal attendance, rigid punctuality, are essence of contract with reference to the distribution of assets. We should, therefore, be pleased to know of your or your son's being safely across, and indeed in London, as soon as possible. We take this opportunity of stating how matters now stand, hoping, without making any suggestion, that the statement may be of utility to you in framing your plans.

You will recollect that, when last we had occasion to communicate with you upon this subject, there remained, including yourself, only five claimants to a share in due time of the accumulated funds. The same fatality, which had by that time removed eight of the original thirteen depositors, seems to have overtaken, certainly two, possibly three, of the survivors.

M. le Comte de Bondy, we hear, was accidentally shot in the boar-hunt at Compiègne. Colonel Rocheville was massacred during the recent troubles of the South— under circumstances, we are informed, which pointed to a case of personal animosity. And now, as regards Sir Jasper Ferrars, we regret to say that nothing has been heard of him for several months, and his absence, at a time when he ought to be back in England, causes us anxiety.

We had this morning a call from Captain von Hanstedt, who, with you and— as we still hope— Sir Jasper, is a remaining beneficiary. His visit was, we understand, merely intended to be an act of presence. He remains in London, and, we repeat, we should be glad to see you here likewise. We can not refrain from suggesting to you, quite in a private manner, of course— the advisability, in presence of the ill-luck which seems in some mysterious way to follow the steps of the members of the association, to exercise an ever-suspecting vigilance; to keep secret, as far as possible, your intentions and your movements, at least until the fifteenth is past. And lastly, if it can be managed, to induce your son to accompany you on your journey here.

We remain, etc.

M. de Goumay poured out his coffee, drank it and ate his white loaf, lost in a painful muse. "Ever-suspectingvigilance." To one of his bland habits the words bore a strangely unpleasant color. They even dimmed the rosy tints of the coming transaction with the delightful old lady. But he was afforded little time for the vexing speculation. The servant brought in another letter.

"Left by hand," said he, "and the messenger waiting at the door."

This was the communication:

M. Henri, Chef de la Sûreté, commands urgently the attendance of M. Havart de Goumay at the Bureau without the least retard. This, in the name of the Law. But M. Henri begs to add that, if M. de Goumay happens to be contemplating an immediate addition to his well-known collection of rare books, the matter at hand is of the highest personal importance to him. M. de Goumay will be good enough to follow the messenger without being seen to communicate with him.

"The great homed devil is in it!" muttered the excellent man. It was not Saint Alipantin now; M. de Goumay was seriously discomposed. He pocketed his let¬ ters, demanded his hat, and his gold-headed cane.

"I follow," he said tartly to the nondescript individual waiting in the vestibule.

And, ten minutes later— it is but a short traject from the Quai Malaquais to the Isle of the Cite— he was introduced to the inner sanctum of the Bureau of Public Safety: a stuffy room, lined from floor to ceiling with green cardboard dossier boxes arranged by the thousand in pigeonholes.

M. HENRI, a youngish, tubby man of small size and no very remarkable appearance, save singularly wide, coldly observant eyes, rose from the table upon which was spread a letter he had been conning.

"You will forgive," he began in quick precise words after a gesture toward his own chair, the only one in the room, "the pressing tone of my letter if it has inconvenienced you. Time is very short. I will ask you, first, if you are acquainted with one of the name of Ferrars, an Englishman?"

M. de Goumay started. Like a flash, the attorney's words "ever-suspecting vigilance" leaped out, as it were, to illumine the white hair and the bright eyes of last eve's visitor.

"One Sir Jasper Ferrars is an old friend of mine," he answered quickly.

"Ah, we are on the road; my guess was happy."

A smile flickered across M. Henri's face.

"You will now give me," he went on, "the address, if you have it, of any One with whom you may lately have entered into communication concerning bibliographic treasures— that is the word." He bent sideways over the table and laid a finger upon the letter. "Especially if it be a woman. One moment, you are a better-lettered man than I, but I believe I am right in presuming that the name Ashtoreth refers to a female devil?"

"Yes, certainly." M. de Goumay sank deeper into wonder. "The Semitic Aphrodite, an evil spirit. And, as a fact, I have an appointment with a lady this morning, between eleven and twelve. Yes, and about treasures," he said ruefully, as he saw in imagination these coveted prizes melting into thin air. "And this is the address."

The Chef de la Sûreté took the card, glanced at it and rang his bell.

"Send in Vidocq," he ordered to the plain-clothes attendant who appeared at the door. Then, to his visitor, "We will be in time. Parbleu, we are lucky! And so are you, M. de Gournay," he added with much meaning, "as you will hear. Ah, Vidocq, I think we have that Montmorency affair well in hand. Here is the address. Take all your measures: the mouse-trap in this case. Have it all fixed up by ten o'clock. Not much time, but, for you— time enough."

M. de Gournay looked with intense curiosity at the celebrated Vidocq, the wily, formidable sleuth-hound whose name was already a terror to whom it might concern: a broad-shouldered massive-headed man, whose appearance, out of service, was that of some sturdy, good-tempered sailor. On duty, there was none who could assume more convincingly the most unlikely disguises.

Vidocq studied the card, repressed a grin of satisfaction, saluted with the hand and disappeared.

"Now, my dear sir," resumed M. Henri, "if you will give me half an hour of your attention, everything in this business, which must of course seem still mysterious, will, I think, be made as clear to you as it is already to us. Your help, besides, will be required to bring to a stop certain sinister machinations which closely concern you. Be good enough to read carefully this letter."

He planted himself with his back to the window and watched M. de Gournay's face. The latter, mounting his spectacle, perused the cryptic document, which ran, in French, as follows:

Belphegor to Ashtoreth, salute and greeting in invisibility! Rejoice and be of firm heart; full success is at hand. You will be relieved to hear that the old fox, who had got such a start of us and had saved his brush so exasperatingly time after time, has at last been run down. We have his skin; he will vex us no more. And now, besides, an unlooked-for piece of luck has come our way. There was, as you know, the cub, still roaming somewhere. We gave no heed to him, for we knew that he had never been let into the secret of the pot-aux-roses by his outraged parent.

Now, what do you think we ran up against on the day we paid our polite visit to the parental hearth? Cub himself, if you please! Cub, trotting the covert incognito! I scented him on the spot. I made sure, took him securely in hand. Captivated by my engaging manner, he, of his own accord, dropped the incognito. These busybodies over here had warned him to remain within reach on the morning of our happy day.

In consequence he is now gone on a pretty chase — under the loving care of Abaddon. He will not trouble us, as Abaddon, who brings you this, beauteous Ashtoreth, will no doubt assure you.

And now the full crowning of our labors depends on your success. The rosy-gilled collector of bibliographic treasures is ready to give any price for armorial bindings, and the parcel I have had conveyed to you contains one which will prove killing bait. Make good use of it. Neglect no detail. By the way, since our friend is an accomplished gourmet, that little repast we have discussed for his consumption— get it at Chevet's or Perignon's. It should be irresistible.

Abaddon will bring you this letter on Monday at latest. Expect me on Tuesday morning. I have every confidence in your skill and nerve, but certain details will have to be adjusted according to Moloch's success. Prepare a room in which I can retire and yet be within call. At a quarter to eleven by the stroke of the church clock be ready to let me in the back way.

Should any necessity arise to explain my presence to any one, you will not forget that Doktor-Philosophe Goertz, Librarian at Leipzig, is hot upon the hunt for Spanish incunabula. But Lucifer keep off any such necessity!

And now, from eager Belphegor, to radiant Ashtoreth, valediction and invisibility!"

Beads of perspiration had appeared on M. de Gournay's face as he drew near the end of the lines, packed so full of hidden meaning. He looked up at last with dire perplexity in his eyes.

"What do you make of it?" asked M. Henri.

"Nothing that is clear— much that seems sinister."

"It is sinister. And it will soon be made clear. This letter," said M. Henri, "was found on the body of a man— sewn in the lining of his coat— a man, not yet identified, but who is obviously the Abaddon mentioned, killed two nights ago by a young English traveler whom he had tried to murder, in the forest of Montmorency. The affair was cleverly planned— we have already, through examination of the young man, reconstituted the whole story— but the Englishman, though badly mauled, succeeded in suppressing Abaddon, instead of being suppressed himself. The Englishman's name is Ferrars, son of the Sir Jasper Ferrars you mentioned."

M. de Goumay gave a start. The chief, pleased with the result of his methodically dramatic way of exposition, went on, intent upon the next effect:

"BELPHEGOR, who sent Mr. Ferrars to be disposed of abroad by his compeer, Abaddon, is beyond doubt a young fashionable, well-known— and, curiously enough, honorably so, under the present regime— as the Baron de Hanstedt."

Here M. de Goumay as if shot by a spring leaped from his chair. He mopped Ins brow.

"Hanstedt! The son of my old friend, the friend of Sir Jasper, a murderer! What, in heaven's name— ah, I've got it— the tontine!"

"A tontine!" cried M. Henri, and his eyes flashed satisfaction. "A tontine, of course. We have puzzled a whole day over the thing, and never guessed. The nearest we could think of was a succession. A tontine; you have an interest in it?"

"I have, indeed," gasped the bibliophile. "I— or my son. And so has—" Then, with a sudden recollection of Mr. Johnstone's communication, "So had, I should say, sir Jasper."

"And so has, I take it, M. de Hanstedt, Belphegor. Any others?"

"No. All the others are already gone. Already gone! This is terrible, M. Henri. And I," he wailed, "I who looked forward, with interest, of course, but in calmness, to whatever share might fall to my lot, if I lived to see it— and to my son, if I did not!"

"Your son. Your possible substitute," put in M. Henri, cruelly attentive; "just as Mr. Ferrars, failing his father."

M. de Goumay turned white.

"My boy, too!" he exclaimed. But, checking the new emotion, he drew himself up resolutely. "You were right, sir; the machinations concern me, closely. But they have concerned others. We must work together, you and I. Now, this may help. You do not read English, probably; I will  translate for you a communication I received this very morning."

"One moment," said the chief.

He rang his bell, wrote a few words on a slip of paper and handed it to the attendant. Then he turned back to his visitor.

"I am listening."

"It is clear, M. de Goumay," he said when the latter had concluded, "that the fate of M. de Bondy, of Colonel Rocheville, of Sir Jasper Ferrars and that which young Ferrars has by luck escaped were governed by the same purpose: elimination in due time. Elimination under plausible appearances, excluding all suggestion of concerted crime. Elimination at the hands of a clever gang of which this Hanstedt is a member. The case of M. de Bondy will be duly attended to. That of the colonel will be more difficult, disguised as it is as an accident of popular commotion; but we shall sift that also.

"This information of yours is of the highest value; we now know the motive of these crimes and can trace them to one association. The mode, I must tell you, is just now all for these secret companionships. 'Each for all, all for each.' I strongly suspect the fraternity which concerns us to be of good social standing— we have known others of the same kind— the most difficult to trace— educated, elegant even— in good circumstances, but on the lookout for great coups; meanwhile, above ordinary suspicion. What sort of a person is Ashtoreth, the soi-disant Spanish comtesse?"

"She would be at ease in any salon."

"Ah, I thought so. And Belphegor, we know, is a dandy of the first water. These vampires masquerade among each other under demoniacal names, with a rallying phrase, 'the Invisibles,' for a wager in this case. I wonder," went on M. Henri, peering again at the paper, "whether we have them all here? Abaddon is done with. Ashtoreth and Belphegor I look to have under my thumb before noon. Who may Moloch be? Bah! He'll come to the net, too! It was a weak thing of Belphegor to put anything down on paper, even without an address, even under fancy names and in tangling parables.

"True, there was scarce a chance in a million of its ever falling under the eye of one who had the end of the thread. But there was one. And it is going to cost him dear. Ah, and what is better, it has saved M. de Gournay, for what had been prepared would have been as plausible, and the result as final, as in the case of Mr. Ferrars, the Comte de Bondy and the colonel. It was a weak thing— certes— for instance, to mention .a bibliophile— wealthy— old -world— rosy- gilled." M. Henri smiled apologetically.

"Above all to speak of him as likely to give any price for armorial bindings. It took us the whole of the afternoon— the case only came for my examination yesterday morning— to become acquainted, by the help of the leading dealers in fine books, with all the noted collectors in Paris. Then, by elimination, we settled it that M. de Gournay was the distinguished person who was this day to be put out of the way."

M. Henri looked at the clock.

"It will soon be time for you to act— I need not ask," said he gravely, "whether you will play out your part in this drama. You will keep the appointment with Ashtoreth, and before twelve o'clock strikes, this invisible association of society brigands, I give you my word, will be a thing of the past. I can not believe," he added earnestly, "that you can hesitate; Mr. Ferrars, wounded as he is, is lending his help."

"But my son, my son!" cried M. de Gournay. "He is as gravely threatened as I am. I must first—"

"I have already seen to that. He will be warned and well watched over."

The old gentleman drew a grateful sigh and again wiped his forehead.

"I am ready," he said simply.

"Your part," said M. Henri, "will be to follow instructions. There is a fiacre wait¬ ing for you at the door. Before you sit down to your next meal, the whole affair— as we say in our profession— will be in the sack."

6: The Discreet House at St. Mandé

IN A back room of the Villa Armande on the outskirts of Vincennes Woods, the charming old lady who had so briskly carried by assault M. de Goumay's book-loving mind was putting the finishing touch to her toilet.

The cosmetics on her table were of a kind that would have puzzled an Abigail, had Condesa Lucanor kept one. But in the solitary and discreet villa the only servant kept was an old woman of the general-utility order. The paint, the lip-salve, the pencils— which were now being applied with consummate skill— were of gray-white; subduing delicately the natural flush of cheek, the carmine of a small mouth fresh and firm; supplying the "crow's feet" which would not mark naturally, for many years to come, the corners of brilliant black eyes; tinging with ashes the natural brown of finely arched eyebrows. The lady brought the white bandeaux a little closer over temples and ears, shadowed this artistic sexagenarian tête under a fall of black lace, gazed at her glass critically and was satisfied.

A moment she stood in front of the window, deeply pensive. The church clock was striking the three-quarters. It meant nothing to her, except that soon now the guileless old man would make his appearance, and she was ready. A frown, however, suddenly hardened her face; she leaned forward, to make sure of what she saw.

A man was hurriedly coming up the path in the waste ground at the back of the discreet house. And, in spite of disguise— the long redingote closely buttoned up, the curly-winged Bolivar hat, the mustache, by nature so black and jaunty, now tinged with gray and drooping, all excellently suited to a person of official pursuits— she knew him.

"What an imprudence!" she said under her voice. "What an imprudence!"

Hastily she ran down and opened the door. He entered and without a word closed the door behind him:

"Has anything happened?" she asked rather breathlessly.

"Nothing but good," he answered, taking her by the waist, about to kiss her lips. But he checked himself. "Your war-paint!" he said and instead kissed her on the nape of the neck. "Nothing but good," he repeated, "nothing but what goes by program. Moloch's stroke is infallible. Properly spitted, the young bird. And the old bird?"

"The old bird," she answered, "may alight any moment. But, Karl—"

"Chut! Don't forget. Doktor Goertz."

"Bah!" she went on impatiently "We are alone. I've sent the harridan to Paris on errands. But Karl, Karl, what brings you here? It seems to me absolute madness! You should be in England, mon cher. That's your part now. Any accident, any hitch to make you late on the day— and where should we be, all of us?"

She tapped her foot fretfully.

"Yes, I know. But still I felt bound to come. Too much depends on the last stroke. Do you know, ma toute belle, that this year's hunt after the millions has been a costly job. I am reduced to my last thousand francs or two. I felt I had to be here. You are clever, the cleverest of us all, perhaps. But still I am the one for the minute detail."

He looked round the toilet-table.

"There!" he said, striding up to it. "These brushes and things— let them be discovered here after your vanishing today, aid all the world knows that your age, like the youth of other women, was in the gallipot. And, instead of a nice feeble old lady, what has to be looked for is probably a young woman. Nay," he added and his eyes kindled, "some fiery full-blooded, beautiful she-devil. But, no time for that now. You see how right I was to come. All that stuff should be burned. At any rate, in with it into your pockets. And now let me see your collation."

They went down again and into a front room. With the leader's eye he took in the display and approved. The napery, the glass, the silver, was of the right simplicity, tinged with elegance."

"You have, I am glad to see, specially attended to the coffee. And this Liqueur des lies, is it ready?" He looked at her smilingly.

"Not yet. Safer always to wait for the last moment— in case of contretemps."

"So much the better," he said. "I have had a new idea, a brilliant one. What more natural than that the old gentleman, so wrapped up in his son, should have a heart- attack when he learns— somewhere between one and two this day— what he will hear. Poison? Never! A heart-stroke— and natural enough, poor man! No, keep your stuff. This—" he pulled out a small phial —"is chiefly digitalis, which M. Orfila vouches will stop a man's pulse within an hour or two."

Coolly, carefully, he poured half the contents into the little decanter and corked the phial again.

"And the remainder," he resumed, "to your own beautiful hands for the coffee! Two barrels, you see, lest one should miss fire; the old bird can't expect to escape both! And tonight, Ashtoreth, her own fair self once more, to Brussels. And Belphegor, for London. Moloch for the Hague, where Abaddon will meet him. By the way, at what time did Abaddon leave you?"

"ABADDON? Was he not with you?" She raised her brow, scenting danger.

"Has he not brought you my letter?"

She shook her head fiercely.

"Sacramentl" The baron stood a moment petrified. After a long pause, during which the brigand lovers looked fixedly into each other's eyes, "Laurette," he said heavily, "something terrible has happened. What? I can't guess. But if Abaddon has not brought you my— that young cub was a deep one. And if so," following his own thought, "if so, it may mean— for us."

The rumbling of wheels intruded into their cogitation. She made a bound to the window.

"There comes de Gournay," she said and looked back at him. Then, with forced calmness, settling the laces round her young throat, "Are we going on with this?"

"Will you see it through?" he asked between his teeth.

"I will if you say yes, Karl," she answered.

He gazed back at her, with widening eyes. Then the words exploded from him:

"Bei Gott, no. I'll not run your neck into it. If we are to come to grief, there's at least, as yet, nothing to connect you with the scheme, after all. Play this morning's game out. It has to be played out, were it but to avert suspicions. But no liqueur for that cursed ganache! Put it away! And nothing in the coffee. Send him off rejoicing with his books, that's all— I'll have you safe at any rate!"

The fiacre had stopped before the house.

"It is time for me to vanish the way I came. I can't help; I'm only a danger to you. Laurette, Laurette, play for your safety now! Put that liqueur away. Who knows? The game may not really be all lost. Even if we have to go halves with Gournay—"

The bell rang. He leaped toward her, looked into her eyes a second and this time passionately kissed her on the lips. She listened pensively to the sound of his steps in the back passages. Then, upon a second summons of the bell, she went to open the front door. And from that moment the stream of Ashtoreth's life began to assume the ways of a torrent in spate.

The driver of the fiacre stood on the threshold, in his broad-brimmed white- glazed hat and his many-caped overcoat.

"This is the Villa Armande, hein, ma bourgeoise?" asked the man, in husky voice common to the profession.

"Yes."

"It is here all right, bourgeois!" he cried over his shoulder.

The door of the fiacre opened. M. de Gournay came down; then he turned round to help out another passenger, whose face was half-hidden in bandages and who limped painfully.

"Good morning, Comtesse," said the bibliophile with elaborate ease. "I am in good time, as you perceive. I trust you will not mind my bringing in this young gentleman, who, you see, has met with an accident. Allow me to enter," he went on hastily, noticing the change that had swept over her face; "he is very feeble. I will explain."

She fell back a pace. He, still guiding his companion, brushed past her into the lobby. Instantly the driver closed the door, locked it and pocketed the key.

"You will explain, sir—" she began haughtily, but with a panting breath.

"In a moment, madame. Is this the room?" pointing to a door through which could be seen the table, attractively spread with the awaiting dejeuner. "Sit down there— madame of course permits—" he went on a little thickly. "Sit down, Mr. Ferrars."

A cry rang into the room like the roar of a wounded panther.

"Ferrars! Did you say Ferrars?"

She had fallen back, almost crouching, against the wall, but the next instant she made a spring toward the bandaged man and was arrested, as it were, in midair by the driver's powerful arm.

"Hold!— Easy if you please, ma belle," he said banteringly, holding her wrist in an inflexible grip. "Tout beau, Madame Ashtoreth!"

She had another gasp of rage. Swift and fierce in hermovements as a fighting cat, with her free hand she lifted her skirt, revealing a vision of shapely young leg, and drewfrom her garter a small ivory-handled stiletto. The slender blue blade flashed a second aloft— only to be seized in its flight by the man's bear-like paw and tossed into a corner of the room.

The fierce action had dragged aside the lace veil and, with it, the sedate white bandeaux. With complete deliberation he removed at one stroke the whole structure, baring thereby a head of short but vigorous brown hair, in strange contrast with the ghastly grayness of the face.

"This affair, you see," he said, as now half-fainting she allowed herself to be pressed down into a seat, "has to be carried through roundly."

So saying, he pulled the window open and from a boatswain's whistle threw into the air a piercing, undulating call. A moment later from the back of the house a door was heard, violently thrown open; then sounded footsteps, heavy, irregular, trampling, stumblihg.

M. de Gournay, pale, trembling a little even— for men of generous temper are always affected to see violence dealt to a woman— stood mopping his forehead.

Mr. Ferrars, leaning forward in his seat, gazed on the scene with intense interest.

The soi-disant cab-driver had his back to the wall, facing the entrance, in a position to keep all present under his eye.

"In here," he ordered.

THRUST forward by two men, who could be seen in the passage but remained outside, Baron von Hanstedt took a pace into the room. He was already manacled. His hair falling over his forehead, his coat torn and half-unbuttoned, testified to a furious struggle. His eyes, blood-rimmed like those of the vanquished wild boar, glared at the squat, broad-shouldered figure that now moved toward him. But he waited speechless. The driver removed his glazed hat.

"I am Vidocq," he said, returning the glare steadily. "And I have got you safe, M. de Hanstedt."

The baron made a dreadful attempt to smile.

"Are you indeed the great Vidocq of whom one hears so much these days? Well, M. Vidocq, you are making an ass of yourself for once. My name is Goertz."

"Pretty name," returned the policier, without an inflexion in his voice. "Perhaps not so pretty as others quite as handy— as Belphegor, for instance. But Hanstedt will do for me, today. Not to mention M. de Goumay here, no doubt Mr. Ferrars can identify—"

From purple the baron grew livid. His wild eyes roamed the room, and fell upon the seated figure with the bandaged head.

"The cub!" he exclaimed in a toneless voice and brought his despairing look round upon the woman, who, with lids half-closed— lips paler than their disguising salve— still lay where she had been thrown.

"Commend me to that for a fair giveaway!" said Vidocq. "We may say you've done for yourself— Belphegor. Your case is drawn clear." Then, as if struck by a new idea, he cast his glance over the tempting array on the table and brought it meditatively to rest on the liqueur flagon. "I think," he pursued, "you realize it yourself. You're not looking quite so well. Emotion— one understands that. You want a rouser. Try some of this."

As he spoke he half-filled a tumbler with the amber liquid and sniffed at it. Then he handed the glass to the captive, who took it mechanically between his fettered hands.

"It smells delicious," said Vidocq, keenly attentive to the man's face.

For a spell the baron remained stock-still, his eyes on the glass, lost in some dreadful musing. He raised them slowly and rested them in turns, with a renewal of their first fierceness, on each of the three men. But when they came upon the woman, all their hardness vanished; there was nought left in them but a passionate, immeasureable regret.

"I see," went on Vidocq in his matter-of- fact voice. "I quite understand. You have your doubts about the quality of Madame Ashtoreth's liqueurs. Well, well, M. Le Professeur Orfila, who is a savant, must look into it."

He stretched an arm to take back the glass. But before the deed could be prevented, Belphegor had raised his joined hands to his mouth, and in quick gulps had swallowed the draft.

"Karl— Karl!" Ashtoreth sprang to her feet, but her scream ended in a wail. She swayed and fell back, covering her face with her hands.

Whatever length of time a glass or two of liqueur might have required for action, the effect of this outrageous dose was fulgurating. The baron, dropping the tumbler, gave a gasp. Frantically endeavoring to press his fettered hands to his temples, he suddenly collapsed— a huddled heap, shaken now and again by a writhing convulsion.

Ferrars had jumped up. M. de Gournay, leaning forward over the back of a chair, stared, frozen with horror.

"There," he murmured to himself, "but for the mercy of God, is the case that was meant to be mine."

Vidocq, with his great bushy brows knitted, was pursing his lips. His whole air was one of overwhelming vexation:

"You've made a slip there, Vidocq, my friend," he muttered at last. "Yes, a bad slip! Yet who the devil would ever have believed that he— well, Belphegor has but cheated the galleys, if not the scaffold."

The dying man's sterterous breathing had ceased. A heavy stillness reigned in the room. After a few seconds a new sound from outside broke the spell— the sound of hurried wheels abruptly checked— of hurried footsteps. Then the bell again and instantly, as the door opened, an eager voice:

"M. Gournay! Is M. de Gournay here?"

A man in groom's livery darted into the room, stumbling over the body on the floor.

"Ah, monsieur, monsieur! Quick! Our poor young master—"

He paused, casting a scared look at the scene; then, dumbly he held out a shp of paper. M. de Gournay had grown ashen white.

"What is it? Ah, God! It is André— it's my son! What is it?"

He snatched the paper from the messenger, tried to read, passed his hand over his' dazed eyes and read again. A sighing groan, heart-rending, rose from his throat. He threw his arms above his head and Vidocq was only just in time to catch him as he fell forward.

"A fit— that's what it is. A coup de sang, poor gentleman," said the policier, with more feeling than might be expected from one of that kidney. "I can guess. Well, what has happened?" he went on, turning half-round to look up at the groom.

"A duel— this morning— with one of those bandits of demi-solde Bonapartists. Ah, my poor young master!"

Vidocq drew the note from the unconscious man's fingers and read out—

"Come quickly, if you would find our Andre still alive."

There was a moment's silence, and then he said:

"So— that was the scheme, a duel with a bretteur! We were just in time, here— but too late for the son." Then, resuming command, "Mr. Ferrars, there is still work for me here, and then I must devote myself to this pretended half-pay, the spadassin. You, my boy," he said to the groom, "must stop here. Mr. Ferrars will take this worthy gentleman back to his home. It's a stroke, a bad stroke, I fear," he added, after looking at M. de Gournay's face. "You may congratulate yourself, sir, on a rather miraculous escape from the crew of Invisibles."

7: Dead Men's Shoes

"AND the last piece of evidence in this long-laid plot, at least as far as I am personally concerned," said Mr. Ferrars to Mr. Wapshot, "came last night. A letter from the butler at Stanton, which I found at the Piazza. An answer to an inquiry I had sent, in my own name by the way, from Paris the day before my departure."

They were passing under the great plane- trees of Gray's Inn Gardens, that swayed and roared in the gusts of a tempestuous wind, on the morning of the fifteenth of October.

Mr. Ferrars, still rather lame, his face badly scarred, but now free from its bandages, was leaning on the arm of his friend and legal counselor on the way from the latter's offices in Gray's Inn Square to those of Messrs. Johnstone & Mesurier in Bedford Row.

"The man states that he knows nothing of any letter for Captain Hanstedt and that he certainly forwarded none. He adds, unfortunately," said Mr. Ferrars, "that he has no news from his master. It bodes ill."

Mr. Wapshot had listened that morning to a detailed account of his client's experiences, but without committing himself to an opinion. After a span of thoughtful silence, he dryly remarked:

"All this, my dear sir, if it does bode ill for Sir Jasper, may mean a singular change in the state of your own affairs. Well, in less than an hour, we shall know where we stand."

"I am still much in the dark. Will you not explain?"

"I really have no knowledge of the matter. It is all in Johnstone and Mesurier's keeping— and, no doubt, they will explain it— if the occasion arises. I have been asked to have you within call. And I am thankful— for, if I don't actually know, I think, I guess— that I have brought you here in time."

They were ringing at the attorney's office. The clerk who opened the door requested them, with Mr. Johnstone's compliments, to step up-stairs and wait in a private room.

Ferrars sat at a bare table and, leaning his head on his hands, lost himself in brooding cogitation.

Mr. Wapshot, however, in the midst of his professional reticence, showed distinct signs of nervousness; pacing the room; consulting his watch at ever shorter intervals; peering with unmistakable anxiety into the broad coldness of Bedford Row, whenever wheels or footsteps were heard approaching the front door. A great clock outside in the passage struck the half-hour; then the three-quarters. Within the room the silence between the two men remained unbroken. At last, the deeper strokes of the hour began to fall.

"Twelve o'clock," said Mr. Wapshot, with attempted indifference consulting his own watch for confirmation. "Twelve by Greenwich."

The last vibration had scarce vanished, when the door was opened:

"Mr. Johnstone's compliments," said the clerk, "and will Mr. Ferrars and Mr. Wapshot be so good as to step down to his room."

Mr. Wapshot heaved a sigh of satisfaction and smilingly motioned his client on.

Four gentlemen, seated round the great mahogany table, rose on their entrance. Every countenance behind the mask of official decorum betrayed an expectant agitation, tinged, in the case of the head of the firm, with a noticeable look of concern. This personage was a pompous man with a large handsome face.

"Mr. Ferrars," he began in a rich unctuous voice and a self-conscious precision of speech, "allow me to offer you welcome— although your presence in this room today betokens the possibility— nay, I fear, the probability— of some tragic occurrence. I am glad, I say, to see you, at least, in attendance on this occasion. I will explain presently. Let me introduce my partner, Mr. Mesurier, also Mr. Parker and Mr. Willis, who represent Tellson's Bank."

The young man bowed; then in silence he took the seat that was offered.

"Mr. Ferrars," went on the attorney, in his methodical, ore rotondo, board-room manner, "these gentlemen and ourselves have met for the purpose of bearing testimony to the actual attendance in propria persona, before the hour of twelve noon— in accordance with a stringent clause of the document which you see on the table and which you will presently have an opportunity to examine— of certain persons, beneficiaries under the provision of a scheme which, for want of another name, we must call a tontine. The scheme in question, however, differs in many ways from the usual device of annuity which goes under that appellation.

"Your Interest in the funds involved— and I may as well say at once, the sum is an important one— was only contingent. By your father's absence, it has become capital. Further, by the inexplicable absence of two others, who, unlike yourself, were fully aware of every clause in this deed, your interest has become total.

"On some other occasion, if you care, I shall tell you the full history of this extraordinary scheme which, started eight and twenty years ago, has reached maturity on this day. Now, however, not to trespass unduly upon the time of these gentlemen, I will only deal with the salient points.

"During the Summer of the year 1789— at a time when all who had eyes to see the swiftly approaching upheaval in France gave anxious thought to the future— a num ber of gentlemen, most of them French, but with them some of other nationalities— one of these being Sir Jasper Ferrars— organized among themselves— there were, to be precise, thirteen of them— a tontine of unusual character, regulated with meticulous care and with the stringent insistence upon the letter as well as the spirit of the agreement.

"The essence of the scheme was that a sum of one million French livres, or in sterling money forty thousand pounds, subscribed by the thirteen original members, was to be deposited outside Revolutionary France— in fact, with an English bank of repute. It was to be left at compound interest for the space of twenty- eight years— after which the accumulated capital would be distributed, each in the proportion of his original subscription, among the survivors, or, in default of any of them, their surviving eldest sons.

"You are aware, no doubt, Mr. Ferrars, that a capital sum placed at five per cent, compound interest doubles itself in fourteen years. Twenty-eight have elapsed since this contract was made— or rather since the money was lodged in its entirety at the bank— and that was on October 14, 1789. The original capital has therefore quadrupled itself. In other words, it now amounts to a little over one hundred and sixty thousand pounds."

The attorney paused a moment, looking, no doubt, for signs of overwhelming emotion in the young man's face. But to his great astonishment finding nothing of the kind, he Resumed in the same orating style:

"The point which, as I hinted before, touches you closely and brings you, Mr. Ferrars, into a position which it was your father's intention— for reasons best known to himself; I will not enter into that painful family matter here— which it was your father's intention, I say, to keep you from if he could, is that by your actual presence here at this moment, of which we take due cognizance, you become beneficiary, beyond the reach of dispute, of the whole of this accruing fund."

Ferrars had grown pale. He was a little giddy, and he had to clear his voice as he said:

"This accession of fortune is very strange, singularly unexpected. But not stranger than the experiences I have met with during this last week."

"To say the truth," went on Mr. Johnstone, considerably surprized at this laconic attitude, "we had reason to fear that something untoward might have happened to Sir Jasper. But we had every reason to expect the appearance of the young Baron Hanstedt and that of M. de Gournay, or, in his default, of his son. There is," said Mr. Johnstone, solemnly, "something sinister attaching to a tontine of this kind, which at best is only a gamble of death and hazard, not an insurance."

"Well may you think so, sir," said Ferrars gravely. "Of the last five survivors,  father would seem to have been hunted— hunted relentlessly by some unknown enemies, invisible, but suspected everywhere in everything, till they appear to have driven him well nigh out of his mind— by now no doubt to an unknown death, or he would be here in my stead at this moment.

"As for M. de Gournay: he died, as I heard, just before I left Paris; died of the death of his son, who was murdered by a duelling bravo. I myself only escaped assassination by a hair's breadth. And Baron von Hanstedt, the organizer for a certainty, of all these 'suppressions,' as he called it, if not indeed of many others among the members of the tontine, has made away with himself in the hour of detection."

Here Mr. Wapshot, who, unable to repress his not unpleasurable emotion, had been almost dancing in his chair, broke all professional decorum and sprang to his feet.

"Mr. Ferrars," he exclaimed. Then, snapped his fingers, "No— Sir Adrian! I congratulate you!"

___________________

Index to "Past Masters" stories, by author.

Issues 31-35

I never envisaged this series of original anthologies going into so many issues, and the ever-growing index to all issues was becoming unwieldy.  Accordingly, I have now divided the Index.  This Index commences with Past Masters 31.

The Index to Issues 1 to 30 can be found in Past Masters 30, or as a stand-alone document uploaded to the Kindle and Epub libraries at MobileRead.

The stories are arranged in Alphabetical order of Author's surname, or if the author's name is consistently a pseudonym, that pseudonym (eg "Owen Oliver").  They are then in alphabetical order of title, disregarding "A", "An" and "The".

F. Anstey

The Talking Horse  34

Robert L. Ahern

Murder Needs No Motive  34

Anonymous

The Lady Detective's Story 32

Wolcott LeClear Beard

A Ledge of Safety 33

H Bedford-Jones

Apache Gold 31

The Devil's Fire 31

The Devil is Dead 31

The Fog at Fiddler's Green 31

The King's Pipe  34

Lady of the Evil Eye 31

Sons of Kalewa 31

Leslie Beresford

Eastern Guile 35

Egerton Castle

The Closed Door  35

The Four Invisibles  35

C. Langton Clarke

The Detective for the Defense 33

Dorothea Conyers

Lord Hillayton's Settlement 35

Captain Dingle

Homeward Bound 33

Deferred 33

George Manville Fenn

Lady Florry's Gems  34

Francis Flagg

The Blue Dimension 33

The Heads of Apex 33

Emile Gaboriau

The Little Old Man of Batignolles

Lady Gilbert

Aurora's Treasure 35

Guy Gilpatric

The Crafty Jerko-Slovaks 32

One Good Tern  35

Beatrice Heron-Maxwell

The Dancer's Mascot  35

Headon Hill

Rogue's Legacy  32

J. L. Hornibrook

Captain Cronhelm's Blunder 35

S. B. H. Hurst

The Brightest Jewel of Them All  32

Marianne Kent

A Black Diamond  35

Otis Adelbert Kline

The Dragoman's Slave Girl 35

Charles J. Mansford

The Dervish of the Nile Pyramid 34

The Great Dial of the Gold-Finders 33

The Hidden Egyptian Shield  34

The Lost Fetish of Walai 35

The Veiled Idol of Kor 32

Mrs. L. T. Meade

Beauty Dear 32

The Yellow Dragon Vases 32

Mrs L. T. Meade and Dr Clifford Halifax, M.D.

The Strange Case of Captain Gascoigne 31

With the Eternal Fires 32

The Small House on Steven's Heath 33

"To Every one His Own Fear"  34

Clarence Herbert New

The Attack from Moscow 32

The Island of Heaven and Hell 32

A Night in the Kremlin 34

The Secret of Banda Sea  34

Owen Oliver

The Cape Conspiracy  35

A Pretty Woman 31

Max Pemberton

The Cripple at the Mill  34

G. G. Pendarves

The Eighth Green Man  35

Hugh Pendexter

It Might Have Happened Otherwise  32

Kingbird 33

The Raven Mocker 33

Lewis Ramsden

Désirée 32

Arthur Somers Roche

The Dayless Diamonds 32

A Flutter in Finance 32

"Illimore!" 31

The Premiere Danseuse 32

The Robbery at the Café Ravasan 31

The Victim of Amnesia 31

William Alexander Taylor

Intermere  33

F A M Webster

Towards Morning 33

Raoul Whitfield

The Caleso Murders 32

Rivals of the Clouds 31

Sinners' Paradise 33

William Alron Wolff

Bait, Hook and Sinker

_________________

Table of Contents

1: One Good Tern / Guy Gilpatric

2: The Lost Fetish of Walai / Charles J. Mansford

3: Captain Cronhelm's Blunder / J. L. Hornibrook

4: The Mysterious Card / Cleveland Moffett

5: The Eighth Green Man / G. G. Pendarves

6: The Dragoman's Slave Girl / Otis Adelbert Kline

7: The Cape Conspiracy / Owen Oliver

8: A Black Diamond / Marianne Kent

9: Eastern Guile / Leslie Beresford

10: Aurora's Treasure / Lady Gilbert

11: The Dancer's Mascot / Beatrice Heron-Maxwell

12: The Closed Door / Egerton Castle

13: Lord Hillayton's Settlement / Dorothea Conyers

14: The Four Invisibles / Egerton Castle