Novelist. TIE &TRICK,

Waikato Times, Volume XXX, Issue 2423, 21 January 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

Novelist. TIE &TRICK,

BY HAWLEY SMAKT, Author ok "Bkkezie Lanuton," "Bkoken Bonds," "Sociai, Sinners," " The Gkeat Tontine," "At I'AULT," &C., &C.

CHAPTER L. DEATH OF GIOVANNI. "You had better go quietly, Signor, for I am in little mood to be trifled with. Make the slightest resistance and you will die. " I have 110 intention of making any resistance," replied Hammerton, quietly comprehending Sarini's speech, more by his action than his words. "You will come, then, to his Excellency and Sarini, assured that his prisoner meant no resistance, released his grip, with the contorting assurance that lie would shoot him at the slightest sign of any endeavour to escape. They traversed the plateau rapidly, and in a few moments stopped at the door of Patroceni's tent. Still keeping a vigilant eye on his prisoner, Sarini sharply called— "Your Excellency! Your Exccllency !" The Count was a light sleeper, and in a moment he- appeared at the door, already dressed. " What is it 1" he demanded. " We knew that we were betrayed but the enemies are rather closer to us than we thought. Our fellows are all drunk. I have just been round tlie camp for the second time to-night, and there is no rousing them. I can't understand it. They were drinking when I went my rounds the first time, and I cautioned them that there were hawks abroad, and they were to have a care not to drink too deeply. Two or three of them might have forgotten the caution, but I cannot understand their all being in such a state of utter insensibility." " Captain Hannnciton," said the 'Count, sharply. " You've been rash to venture once more into the -tiger's den. 'We agreed once before that you would not stick at trifles to lay your hand upon thirty thousand

pounds, It is a bold game, but it's like to be a fatal one to you. Well thought out, well thought out. Win your cousin's hand or not, Sir Jasper was bound to do something pretty liberal for the man who dared so much to save him thirty thousand pounds." " You mistake me altogether, Count. I have risked my life, I know. Risked it not to keep faith with you, bnt for the sake of those whose lives you hold in your hand." " Thanks for your information,' sneered the Count. "I discovered that for myself when I had the pleasure of seeing you in Naples. Even conversed with the police spy, who is fool enough to think that he has circumvented Patroceni. Come to warn me, forsooth. You have come with the police at your heels. Mold Sarini. I will go round for myself. You will take care of our enterprising friend here. If he moves a finger you will know what to do," and the Count rapidly crossed the plateau. He came first to the sleeping group, opposite the step-ping-stones of the brook. He looked round at the scene of the revel-half empty wine flasks, tin pannikins in which the liquor still stood. Patroceni shook two of the sleepers. " As I thought," he muttered. Then stooping down, he raised one of the half-filled pannikins to his lips and tasted it. Again he rinsed his mouth with the contents, then spat it cautiously out on the grass. " Druif/ed / And pretty stiffly too. A clever plant. That agent of police who planned this coup s rather cleverer than I gave him credit for. How did he get his wine into the camp V And pondering ovei that problem the Count crossed the stream, and proceeded further down the opposite bank. He came one after the other to the sentries that Wammerton haci passed, and striking across to the spring followed the track towards the boulders some little distance. He listened attentively for quite ten minutes, but no sound reached his cur save the faint rustling of the trees. Then Patroceni turned back, and rapidly went round amongst his men. He found them all more or less senseless. Some of them indeed when shaken, awoke for two or three minutes, and made some attempt to rise. "But the fatal lethargy soon overtook them again, and they sunk back to resume their disturbed slumbers. Some there were who were no more to be roused from their insensibility tlia.ii so many corpses. A frightful impreccation escaped Patroceni's lips as he recognised the crafty treachery that had been practised on him, and he made his way back to his tent in a frame of mind that boded small mercy for his prisoners. He entered the tent where Sariui, pistol in hand, was keeping grim watch upon the captive. " It is as you said," he exclaimed " treachery foul and ingenious has been practised on us, Captain Hanimerton, if you would make your peaoe with the Church you had best to it to-night. You will die with your comrades at daybreak." " I have been fool enough, , ' rejoined Hanimerton, "to do my best ;o warn you of the approach of the police. I suppose I shall pay the penalty for having tried to behave honestly to you for once. There is one thing, Count, make no mistake about it. Whatever blood you shed here is likely to be speedily avenged. 1 know the state of your followers, and once more warn you, as I did before, that the police will be upon you before many hours have passed. Ely ! leave us, and trust to mo that tho money shall be paid, whatever you choose to name." "Trust to you," interposed Patroceni, scornfully. " It would argue much want of intelligence if 1 did. No, Your plan was ingenious, but Sarini and myself are old conspirators. I do not intend you should live to enjoy the profits of your treachery. There will be little fear," he continued with a sneer, "of your imitating Iscariot now. The ending of hie history is just the part you would omit." And as he finished the Count made a sign to his lieutenant, who promptly pinioned Hammertoes arms from behind. " Don't struggle," said Patroceni, " we are two armed and determinod men, and of course can kill you now if we wisii to. It is better to wait a few hours and see whether luck may not turn in your favour. In the meantime, when the prisoners out-number the garrison it is only common prudence to bind them." And in another minute or two Hanimerton found his arms pinioned behind his back. That done the Count pointed to his bed and bade him take the rest ho must require. Tired and worn out as he was, in spite of the discomfiture of his bonds, Hanimerton ws soon asleep. Giovanni in the meanwhile, after a short nap, in some measure recovered from his fatigue, pushed rapidly forward, passed the boulders, followed the track up to the fountain, struck oft' through the wood, and as Hainmerton had done some two hours before he came to the first sentry on the brook. Like Hamimu-ton, he was astounded at the stupor in which he found him, and his amazement was still further increased by discovering the next in pretty much the same state. But when he had crossed the brook his ast-'iiishuuent knew no

bounds. He gazed critically at the relics of tho revel, and a f (, ar came over him as the insensible forms of his comrades met his eye. Giouanni could certainly claim to be a judge of drunkenness in all its phases, but as he shook first one and then another of his fellows, and failed to rouse them from their trance, a feeling of terror came over him. " That is not drunkenness," he muttered, turning white almost to his lips, and kneeling down by the prostrate form of his old friend Pietro. Santa Diavolo ! They are poisoned. Once more he looked round, and a line flask at Pietro's side met his eye. He raised it, and under any other circumstances would probably have swallowed the remainder of its contents ; as it was he gazed ab it curiously, and promptly recognised that it was one of that pattern of which the Signor Stein had been so lavish. He understood it now. Pietro had invited his comrades to have a bout over the last basket that he, Giovanni, had forwarded. Merciful heavens ! that wine must have been poisoned. That villainous old man had dealt with his brethren as if they were rats. He sank on his knees in the extremity of his terror. This man whose life had been stained with crime, who had only recently committed a double murder, nowcowered in unutterable horror at the thought of having been, though unwittingly, the destroyer of all his companions. "They were good to me, some of them," he muttered. " If it had not been for Pietro and two or three more I should not have been alive to poison men like rats. I have slain more than one in my time, but it was by bullet or steel. I never sent one to bis grave in such a cowardly fashion ;is this. Holy Virgin, the place will haunt me. I shall see it in my dreams, and their ghosts will point and gibber at me from the brook.side here. I who have broke bread and drank with them, to poison their wine cup ; " and the terrified man literally grovelled on the ground at the idea of the death plague he had scattered round hint. " Are they all dead ']" he murmured. "Surely his Excellency did not touch it. And Signor Sarini ? He must be alive. What am I to do ? 1 dare not go ioi ward, the way seems strewn with corpses, as if Matteo and that miserable woman were not enough to see in the night time. He died hard, did Matteo; but it served him right. No fault of his he did not cause my death. I did his, and coward as he was, how he fought ! But I was mad with drink that night, and my eyes red with blood. I'd have killed him had he been twice as strong ; and that fool of a woman, what impelled her to come upon the tiger just as he had struck down his quarry? Well, she died too !" He uttered, the hist words half unconsciously aloud. A mocking voice promptly answered him. "Don't frot yourself on that point, Giovanni. You are about to follow them." And himself on his knees, the bandit saw his chief standing a few paces from him, with his pistol levelled at his head. "This, you scoundrel, is, I presume, your work. I saw you myself at Naples in close conversation with the police. It is through your means they have introduced this half-poisoned stuff into the camp, whereby you consign the whole of your comrades to tho grave or the gallows. It was foolish of me to give you such a slight chance for your life as I gave you last time. I might havo known if you lived I should repent it. Don't think I am going to make that mistake again." " You saw mo in Naples, Excellency ? " stammered Giovanni. " Yes. You've not forgotten the Golden Bush, I should think. Perhaps you remember the dumb pedlar, who sat at the next table to you at luncheon. I was that pedlar, and tho man you were lunching with was a police agent. Quick ! Your time is short. Was it not you sent this Mine ? " "Yes, your Excellency, but I knew not that it was anything but good wine." Giovanni was much less terrified at the wrath of his chief than at the phantoms his imagination had conjured up just before. "And that pleasant old gentleman with the spectacles gave it you to send, I suppose. ' " Si, ExceUenza" replied Giovanni." "Then, go as herald to those whom your drunken stupidity has doomed to destruction; " and, as ho finished, tho Count's revolver cracked, sharp and shrill; and Giovanni had preceded his comrades across tho Styx. " There will be no resurrection this time." The Count's bullet had sped straight aud true, and Giovanni fell back, shot through the heart. CHAPTER LI. LEROUX AEEIVES AT THE PLATEAU. As Giovanni rolled over a veritable corpse among eo many apparent ones, Leroux with his men had reached tho edge of tho woods. There he halted his main body while with his scouts he sought for the path, of whoso existence he was now aware. From ono or two frightened peasants whom ho had made prisoners on the way he had extracted a very fair idea of the way to Patroceui's retreat. He had made no mistake so far, but it was

just this last, bit through the woods that was difficult to follow without a guide. There was a delay of some time before the scouts discovered it, and the moonlight was waning when he finally plunged amid the trees. The most dangerous part of his enterprise had now commenced; the narrow path only permitted of their proceeding two a breast. The dark hour before the morn was approaching, and they were liable to be attacked by invisible foes at almost any moment. Leroux fancied he had heard a shot when they first came up to the woods, but it was so faint and far away that he could not be sure. The report of a revolver does not echo very far. Slowly and cautiously they made their way-along—finger on trigger, and with eyes peering into the darkness. Leroux led the way ,in person. The wine might or might not have done its work. Such a wary old fox as Patroceni might have discovered this hamper coining into his camp, and would be certain to examine it. At last they arrived at the fountain. There the path apparently ended, as the police agent had been correctly informed it would. Leroux knew now, that he was very near the brigand's camp, and that the greatest caution and complete silence were absolutely necessary. It had now become so very dark that Leroux determined to wait, for daybreak. He was quite tactical enough to know that he could not utilise his superiority in numbers, except in the open, A very inferior force, knowing the ground and attacking him here amongst the trees, would be quite on an equality with him. He calculated that the first streaks of grey would appear in the sky in half an hour. As soon as it was fairly light-that is, in about an hour, he would feel his way to the brook, collect his men on the edge of it, and then make a blood rush at the plateau. If the drugged wine had been partaken of the work would be easy, but .it wus hardly likely that so noted a bandit as Patroceni would be taken without some bloodshed. It could hardly be hoped tlvit he, as well as all his men, would have fallen into the insidious trap that had been laid for them. Having enjoined the strictest silence on all his followers, Leroux sat quietly down by the fountain to wait for the light. Leaving the police agent and his men bivouacing by the fountain, we must now look back upon what is happening in the camp. After the death of Giovanni, the Count and Sarini walked quietly bade to the former's tent. " We must leave this at daybreak," he said ; " it's the cleverest snare that ever was sot for mo. I shrtll make an example before I go. The police must be made to understand that brigandage is a profession, not to be rashly meddled with. There are too many political exiles depend upon it for a living." " Are all the men to die, Excellency ?" " No; I think not. We will give Sir Jasper and his old fool of a butler their lives. They will be here most likely as the day wears on. Of the two men who have betrayed us, on has died, the other expiates his treachery at sunrise. The Signors Glanneld and Wheldrake I regret it, but they must suffer as examples in accordance with the law of the mountains. But, Sarini, we must not forget that there are only our two selves now to administer justice. Don't think me a sticker for etiquette, my old comrade, but you know in the ordinary way we should have paraded the three culprits in a row, bandaged their eyes, unless they professed to be able to look into the levelled carbines without blenching, and shot them in orthodox fashion. As it is we must first of all dispose of Hainmerton, and we must deal with the other two, in less military fashion; even when unarmed I have seen men think it worth while to make a throw of their lives, and that there are only two of us might encourage these perverse Englishmen to attempt such folly." "It will make very little difference, Excellency. It may give a little more trouble, and if you and I can't deal as we list with a couple of unarmed men, then the training of years goes for nought. Our nerves are little likely to fail us at the sight of some slight difficulty." " True ; and now oft' with you ! We've time to spare yet and I've some few preparations to make here before we start. Could Patroceni have heard the conversation carried on in an undertone iu the adjoining tout he might have been confirmed in his opinion, that these perverse Englishmen wero likely to give trouble. Glantield had been roused from a fitful slumber by the report of Patroceni's pistol. He at once shook his companion." " Did you hear that," he said. " It was a shot close to the camp, Of course, it may mean anything. It may mean that one of our drunken captors has discharged his gun by accident: it may mean that one of their sentries has mistaken a bush for a police oflicer ; it might be that most dangerous of all things—soldiers advancing to release us. It is not likely ; but there may be a turn-up in our favour before to-niorr ow. We ai-o not, struck out of till engagements yet." Not quite yet, Jim," replied Wheldrake, with a faint smile. "Sucha very few weeks back, and I would have cared so little, if it

were so, but it seems hard now. Life look? so rosy before ono. I am assured of Maude's love. I have only, on my return to England, to find Hammertoes confederate to clear my good name. That should be easy. Yes, life is sweet to me ! It is bitter to die now." Glantield put his glass in his eye and leisurely surveyed his companion for a moment. " Shake hands, old fellow," he said. " Those are about my feelings, only I should have expressed it as a deuce of a sell. I'll tell you what, Cyril, I don't see why we shouldn't strike a blow for our lives, if we sec a chance." " We are more morally fettered, Jim, than if we were bound hand and foot. The slightest attempt of that kind might cost the lives of those very clear to us. A more ruthless tiger than Patroceni, in spite of all his purring never existed. Let his prey escape him, and he will rend all within his reach. No, it's hard, but we must die quietly." "Don't be afraid but what I'll die quietly enough if it comes to that," replied Glaiitield, doggedly. " but if I see a twenty to one chance for our lives I mean to take it. Even Patroceni would never be tiger enough to harm our sweethearts, and don't you think they would bid us strike a blow to save ourselves, if we got a fair chance." "You have no business to endanger their safety," replied Wholdrake, sternly. i " There is no use quarrelling over j it," replied Glantield. I p.ro not going to do anything rash, and it is long odds against my getting n, chance to do anything at all. But remember, if I do holloa to you, you can stand out of it or not as you like, but you will see a fight." Wheldrake made no reply, but threw himself moodily on the bed. Tiie faintest streak of dawn could be first seen in the sky from the plateau, invisible to Leroux and his men amongst the woods. But the police figont had become restless, and whispeivd to the captain of the gendarmerie acting under his orders to remain where he was whilst he crept a little way forward to explore. Ho took two or three of his own men with him, and then carefully taking his bearings started j in the direction of the brook. At an interval of about fifty paces hedropped a man to ensure; his being 1 able to find his way back, with instructions to reply immediately to a low whistle. He was surprisingly fortunate, for by the time he had dropped his last man he had hit off the brook. Cautiously he crept along the bank till he came to that first insensible sentry. Leroux's pulses tingled. The man seemed sound asleep—how sound? Could this be the first of his victims 1 Drawing a poignard from his breast he advanced steadily to the sleeper's side. He slept soundly, but he must know how soundly. Gripping his dagger closely he placed his hand upon his shoulder. It was well for that sleeper he had drank deeply of the cup. Had he suddenly displayed active animation Leroux's poignard would have been buried in his breast. But no; he was sensluss as the tree against which he leaned. Leroux shook him roughly, and still he moved not. Then the police agent uttered a low laugh and, turning on his heel, wended his way quickly back to his men. Leaving the scouts he had placed where they were, no sooner did Leroux reach the fountain than, placing himself at the head of his party, he gave the word to move on, and rapidly led them to the banks of the stream, cautiously proceeding them a few yards. Quietly they crept along the bank, the police agent as he passed the insensible sentry, signing to his men to bind him. No doubt now that hio stratagem had suoeoeded. Quietly he made his way till hs came to the stepping stones then he crossed. It was daybreak on the plateau and, as he cleared the brook, which ran along the extreme edge of the wood he came across the scene of that fatal revel, fatal in appearance as that of the famous banquet of the veiled Prophet of Khorassan. Leroux held up his hand as a signal for those behind him to halt, and then stepped forward to investigate affairs. From where the brigands had held what was destined to be the final drinking bout for most of them, the ground ran with a gentle slope up to the edge of the plateau, so that a man could nioveabout without seeing anything that was going on just above him, nor be seen from that little bit of table land, unless by some one on its edge. The wily police agent took in the whole scene at a glance. The half-finished wine flasks, the half-emptied pannikins, the drunkenrevelloivsstrewn around, looking as if dead. "All this," muttered Leroux to himself, " the simple result of a well-admimistered opiate. Ah," he said, with a low laugh, " quite a new departure in the profession—the calling in of medical science to aid in the apprehension of criminals." But suddenly Giovanni's form caught his eye. " That one is not drugged," he muttered, " he's dead in good earnest." In a moment he was by his side, and turned up his face. " Mou Dieu ! " he murmured, as the first fresh rays of the sun fell on the upturned features of the dead bandit, " My valued friend with the irrepressible thirst !" Quick as thought he drew back the dead man's eyelid ; but tho fierce light of

the savage orbs was quenched. A slight welling of blood from Giovanni's chest showed how he had come by his end. " Shot for his treachery, no doubt," mused Leroux, as he stepped quietly back to his party. His orders were now prompt and decisive. Eapidly and noiselessly they crossed the stream, and spread themselves out under the crest of the slope, with strict orders to advance with a rush the minute Leroux gave the signal, then the police agent crept cautiously forward, raised his head abo/e the crest, and saw a sight that for the moment enchained him. Standing bareheaded, with his arms pinioned behind his back, was Hainmerton, and Leroux's astonishment at seeing here a man whom he believed to be in Naples was unbounded. Six paces in front of Hanimerton, pistol in hand, stood the peasant whom he had taken out boating, while a second peasant was anxiously listening to what the first was saying. (To be Continued.)