THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 
 r
 
 4 
 
 MAROZIA 
 

 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 Crown 8vo., Cloth, 6s. each. 
 
 A LINDSAY O' THE DALE. 
 
 " One of the liveliest and most stirring books 
 of adventure that has been published these 
 . many years." Country Life. 
 
 THE WATCHER ON THE TOWER. 
 
 " The pictures of the life of the persecuted 
 Jews have a dramatic power not unworthy of 
 the masterpieces of Russian fiction " The 
 British Weekly. 
 
 LONDON : T. FISHER UNWIN. 

 
 BY 
 
 A. G. HALES 
 
 AUTHOR OF "A LINDSAY O' THE DALE, 
 "THE WATCHER ON THE TOWER," 
 " M'GLUSKY," 
 " ANGEL JIM," 
 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN 
 
 ADELPHI TERRACE 
 1908
 
 
 
 
 
 [All rights reserved.] 

 
 TO MY FRIEND 
 
 DH HERBERT GREENWOOD 
 
 IN GRATEFUL MEMORY OF HIS SKILL AND CARE 
 WHILST ATTENDING ONE VERY DEAR TO US 
 
 WITH BEST WISHES 
 
 
 
 FROM THE AUTHOR 
 
 
 * _ 145'
 
 

 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. PAGE 
 
 I. BORIS, THE HUNTEB .... 1 
 
 II. THE HORSESHOE LETTER . . . .15 
 
 III. SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK .... 29 
 
 IV. IN THE VALE OF ROSES .... 43 
 V. LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER ... 57 
 
 vi. A STRONG MAN'S WOOING .... 76 
 
 VII. LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL .... 89 
 
 VIII t THE DEATH OF MAROZIA . . . .107 
 
 IX. THE MYSTERY OF THE RED FARM . . .123 
 
 X. HASSAN, THE NUBIAN .... 139 
 
 XI. A SPORTING CHANCE . . . .153 
 
 XII. THE HAUNTED MAN . . . . 167 
 
 XIII. FROM THE BURIED PAST .... 181 
 
 XIV. A HUNTER OF LIONS AND A GIVER OF KISSKS . 197 
 
 XV. THE MAN WHO RISKED IT . . . . 215 
 
 XVI. PAUL THE FEARLESS .... 239 
 
 XVII. A BUNCH OF ROSES GATHERED IN THE WEST . 249 
 
 XVIII. THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA . . v . 261 
 
 XIX. A COOLGARDIE IDYLL .... 277 
 
 XX. THE WIDOW BINGHAM .... 291 
 
 XXI. LITTLE WOOD PIGEON . . . .311 
 
 XXII. THE FIDDLE OF DEATH , 325 
 
 Vll
 

 
 I 
 
 BORIS, THE HUNTER
 

 
 MAROZIA 
 
 MAROZIA the Queen was a very lovely 
 woman, and a very masterful, wilful, wayward 
 woman to boot. Before her lord the King 
 married her, and lifted her to a throne, she 
 had made use of her fateful beauty in a 
 reckless fashion ; nor did she trouble over- 
 much to mend her ways after the crown was 
 upon her glossy head, for in Marozia's veins 
 ran hot blood. . Scandal had been busy with 
 her name for years before she became the 
 Consort of the King. 
 
 I, who chronicle these things, had often 
 heard her name mentioned with the careless 
 laugh, the shrug of the shoulders, and the 
 half-opened hand hollowed round the mouth, 
 which accompanies a tale told to the detri- 
 ment of a woman. 
 
 Some of these stories were doubtless lies, 
 3
 
 4 MAROZIA 
 
 fashioned by malice out of material woven 
 from flimsy imagination, for liars are hatched 
 under every bush in these days, the wide 
 world over. I think such men have always 
 lived, ever since the morning stars first sang 
 together men who know how to strike a 
 woman where she is weakest. 
 
 I had heard much of the Royal wanton in 
 my wanderings. Men had told me of her 
 as I sat sipping Turkish coffee with baggy- 
 breeched Mussulmans in the cafe's in Philip- 
 popolis, where fierce - eyed servants of the 
 Sultan glare with insolent dislike at a 
 Christian, and toy only too readily with a 
 knife hilt on small pretext. 
 
 I had listened to her name coupled with 
 sneers and coarse jests, as I drifted down the 
 Bosphorus to the lazy music of the boatman's 
 eternal chant. She was known from Morocco 
 to Berlin, partly on account of her voluptuous 
 beauty, partly because she had a roving eye 
 for a well-knit man, and she never scrupled 
 to please her eye, no matter what the cost or 
 the consequences might be. 
 
 A man could not join a shooting or a hunt- 
 ing party in the Near East without hearing of 
 her escapades ; she was talked of around the 
 bivouac fires as well as in cities, and when at 
 last she fell dead in her own bed-chamber, 
 pierced by many a dagger stroke, and many 

 
 BORIS, THE HUNTER 5 
 
 a bullet, there were hundreds of men who 
 lifted their eyebrows, and said : " Eh, but we 
 knew it would come to that in the end. Like 
 the buck that braves the rifle every spring, 
 she had to fall eventually." 
 
 She was a woman of trim figure, knowing 
 how to carry herself bravely, and there was 
 that about her which made men who were 
 usually cold and cautious grow hot arid reck- 
 less. Part of this influence over men she 
 owed to her face and figure; part to her 
 passionate, impetuous nature, part also to her 
 charm of manner, and also in some degree to 
 the daring courage of her disposition. 
 
 For Marozia was brave, much braver than 
 most men. Physical fear was an unknown 
 quality to her. She was equally at home in 
 a ballroom or in a saddle, at a wolf hunt, or 
 a skating carnival. She loved power, political 
 intrigues, and adulation, and she hated women, 
 old or young, rich or poor, peasant or peeress. 
 Her eyes were large and full, her eyebrows 
 beautifully arched and pencilled, her features 
 strong, regular, and finely chiselled. Her 
 mouth was made for caresses, her colouring 
 rich and warm. Her hair thick, long, and 
 glossy, and her voice a musical marvel. 
 She was an adventuress armed at all points, 
 one of those women who come into the 
 world at times to carry all before them.
 
 6 MAROZIA 
 
 Before she met and enslaved her lord the 
 King it was openly stated that she was the 
 mistress of a military man, whose love turned 
 to venomous hatred ; and his hand, later, 
 helped to do her to death she was the evil 
 genius of many. Few of those with whom 
 she toyed so wantonly left her side unscathed. 
 Mabon the King fell dead across her bleed- 
 ing body, and his gashed corpse was thrown 
 with hers, through the Palace window, on to 
 the stones below. 
 
 I stood upon the spot, and saw the blood- 
 stains on the stones. I saw the rude grave 
 into which both were bundled with less 
 ceremony than is paid to the burying of 
 coolies. And one night I stood there 'midst 
 snow and sleet, whilst half a dozen men swore 
 upon their sword-hilts to avenge her some 
 day. They have not done it yet, perhaps 
 they never will do it; or they may, for the 
 men of their blood are a peculiar breed. 
 They can be icicles, and they can be volcanic ; 
 they can play the giant or the dwarf; they 
 can be as simple as children and as subtle as 
 serpents each part in its turn. They may 
 forget a kindness ; I have never known one 
 of them to forget a debt of hate. But it is 
 of the amours of Marozia the Queen that I 
 started to write, not of the idiosyncrasies of 
 her people. And now let me tell the tale as
 
 BORIS, THE HUNTER 7 
 
 it was told to me one night when I sat in a 
 rude hunting-lodge in the Perrin Mountains, 
 along with the big Swedish hunter, Bjorn 
 Nielson, and some Macedonian sportsmen, and 
 a little Russian officer whose friendship was 
 dear to me. 
 
 We had been wolf-hunting all day, climb- 
 ing over the tall, steep mountains, and diving 
 down into the dark glens ; and I had not 
 come out of it with any credit, for I had 
 slipped down a ravine, and had cracked a 
 rib. The big Swede had carried me up the 
 mountain side in his arms like a babe, and 
 had laughed when I told him not to overdo 
 his strength. But we were comfortable in the 
 hunting-lodge, a great fire filled the chimney- 
 place, which stretched right across one end of 
 the building ; and the smell of burning pine 
 was wondrous sweet, as it mingled with the 
 perfume of Turkish tobacco. 
 
 "Why," I asked, "is this called Marozia's 
 Lodge ? " And an old man, who was our 
 guide, servant, and comrade, had made answer, 
 saying : " This is the hunting-lodge where 
 Marozia the Beautiful used to sleep when she 
 came here to hunt the wolf." 
 
 " Was she a huntress of big game, then ? " 
 I asked. And the man smiled in my face, 
 saying : " Yes, sir, Marozia was a huntress, and 
 a bold one ; few men had a bigger heart or
 
 8 MAROZIA 
 
 a better nerve. I have seen her stand and 
 shoot into a wolf pack that snarled around 
 her in the open, as coolly as any professional 
 hunter of us all, and she was quick too." He 
 gazed into the fire pensively for a little space, 
 and then I saw a smile gather in his keen, old 
 eyes. " She was worth looking at always, but 
 when her fighting blood was roused then it 
 was worth a long day's march to look at her, 
 with her blazing eyes, her firm-clenched mouth, 
 and her body poised lightly and strongly upon 
 her small feet. No wonder Boris Metchcliffe 
 lost his heart and his head to her." 
 
 " Tell me concerning that," I interrupted, 
 " I like to hear of love and lovers' doings. It 
 is greater far than tales of hunting or fighting." 
 
 " Do you think so ? " answered the old man 
 turning back his grizzled hair from his forehead. 
 " Well, Boris had done much fighting and 
 more hunting in his time before he made love 
 to Marozia the Beautiful ; but none of it ever 
 brought him as much harm as his wooing. I 
 warned him, but he had laughed in my face, 
 telling me that my old blood had run thin, 
 like wine that the vinters spoil with snow 
 water. 
 
 " Boris was a big man, with a strong, 
 magnetic face, one of those men whom one 
 loves to see by his side when spears are 
 dipping to the charge. He was a mountain
 
 BORIS, THE HUNTER 9 
 
 man, as his father and his father's father had 
 been before him for generations. A peasant, 
 a hunter, and a fighter. He had fought the 
 Turks in many an engagement, and hated 
 them with all his heart and soul, as a good 
 Christian should hate all infidels. When he 
 was at home Boris used to till his little patch 
 of soil on the slope of the mountain, where 
 his cabin perched, and sing as he guided the 
 plough. 
 
 " He said it cheered the oxen to hear a 
 ploughman sing blithely, and they needed 
 cheering, for the mountain side was steep, 
 and the soil was full of rocks, and the cattle 
 were small. Many a blithe peasant lass would 
 encourage Boris with her eyes when he went 
 to the little church on Sundays, or when they 
 met him at the village feasts and dances, but 
 he kept himself heart-whole and happy until 
 he met Marozia the Queen when she came 
 here on one of her winter expeditions. Boris 
 was one of the tried hunters, and it so 
 happened that fate made him one of the 
 personal attendants of Marozia the witch. I 
 was the other. When Marozia came to the 
 mountains, she was jaded and weary with 
 the life of cities, but soon the snow and the 
 wind, the perfume of the forest pines, and 
 the climbing and shooting brought her back 
 to health. The wind whipped her cheeks
 
 10 MAROZIA 
 
 until they glowed with colour, not the pretty 
 pink that you see in some faces, but the deep, 
 rich red of the rose that grows in our valleys. 
 
 "At first all was well with Boris. He 
 looked at Marozia as a goddess who was far 
 up out of his reach, and if she had let him 
 alone his madness would have burned itself 
 out in time, as our forest fires burn themselves 
 out when the wind is still. But it was not 
 Marozia's way to let a man alone if he pleased 
 her eye. The freshness of the mountaineer, 
 his springy step as he strode over the hills, 
 his hearty, happy laugh, his blithe song, his 
 rude, untutored manliness, his bold indepen- 
 dent spirit, and his immense strength of limb, 
 all called to her, and appealed to her, and 
 woke the tigress in her nature. She would 
 sport with this man, play with him until she 
 tired, and then well the wind has sung that 
 song too often for me to need to tell it again. 
 
 " In the daytime she would make Boris 
 attend her, treating him as an equal, not as 
 a hunter. I have seen her lift his wine flask 
 to her lips and drink, and then pass it to 
 him, and I have seen her smile because his 
 hand shook like a leaf as he lifted it to his 
 mouth. Often when we came to a rift in 
 the mountain side she would call to Boris 
 and beg him to lift her over, and he would 
 take her up in his big arms and spring across
 
 BORIS, THE HUNTER 11 
 
 like a buck, making nothing of her weight; 
 but if he did not happen to be near, and I 
 offered my services, she would let the heavy 
 lids drop down over her large eyes and look 
 at me with a laugh playing about her mouth 
 such an insolent look, full of a warning to 
 me to know my place and keep it, for Marozia 
 knew well that I was trying to keep the 
 son of my old friend from making a fool of 
 himself. 
 
 " Then, light of foot as any doe, she would 
 spring over the rift, letting me see that it 
 was the man, not the man's help, that she 
 needed, and meant to have. Once I spoke 
 plainly to Boris, for the sake of the lifelong 
 friendship I had borne his father, and words 
 had passed between him and me that had 
 sent my hand to the hilt of my hunting-knife ; 
 but I remembered in time that it was his 
 father who stood over me, yataghan in hand, 
 in the narrow pass, and saved me from the 
 butcher's knife in the rout that followed the 
 Battle of Plevhina. 
 
 " Marozia drew the young man to her as 
 the moon draws the sea. At night she 
 would make him sit with her by her bivouac 
 fire, and tell her tales of our peasant life, or 
 sing her songs, and she would sing to him, 
 just as if he were some haughty noble instead 
 of a simple hunter. She played the peasant
 
 12 MAROZIA 
 
 damsel's part in those wonderful hours, braid- 
 ing her glossy hair by the twilight, and 
 bewitching him with her smiles, and he went 
 mad I think, mad with love, just as some 
 men go mad with wine. She and he would 
 go away at times with no attendant, and be 
 lost for a whole day amidst the eternal forests, 
 and at night when the moon was rising high 
 in the skies, and the stars were shining down 
 upon the world, they would come back to 
 the bivouac hand in hand. The scandal blazed 
 far and near until the wooing of Boris the 
 Hunter, and Marozia the Queen, was talked 
 of in every peasant's hut in the sweep of the 
 Perrin Mountains. 
 
 " And we wondered what Mabon the King 
 would say when it reached his ears in his 
 far-off capital. 
 
 " The end came as quickly as the beginning. 
 Her love melted away as snow melts when 
 the frost breaks and the hot sun shines out 
 suddenly. For that was Marozia's way with 
 men. She left him one night with burning 
 kisses, she met him in the morning with a 
 little, cold, mocking laugh, and put him in 
 his servant's place again. She wanted new 
 wine ; the old clogged her palate. He stood 
 like a man who is struck from behind with 
 the steel stood and looked at her. And 
 she lolled back in her furs, and draping her
 
 BORIS, THE HUNTER 13 
 
 wonderful eyes with heavy lids and long 
 lashes, eyed him with queenly insolence, 
 insulting him silently with her eyes. 
 
 " Slowly the colour came back to his cheeks 
 until they burnt a dusky red, and I for a 
 moment fancied he would spring upon her 
 and crush her, for I knew, and he knew, what 
 this would mean to him. He would be the 
 butt of every wine-shop jester for the rest of 
 his life, and the peasant girls would flout him 
 as a fool who had filled his mouth with honey 
 beyond his eating. His name would be a peg 
 for fools to hang a taunt and a laugh upon, and 
 the girls would make songs about him and his 
 foolishness, to sing as they worked in the 
 tobacco plantations or amidst the vines, or 
 when they plucked the petals for the making 
 of attar of roses. 
 
 " Marozia was very near her death that 
 hour, but she did not flinch. She met his 
 angry glances with unaverted head and mock- 
 ing eyes. He hung upon her eyes for nearly 
 a minute, then he threw up his head and 
 laughed the low, mocking laugh of a man 
 who throws a wanton from him when he has 
 tired of her caresses, and looked her up and 
 down, slowly, contemptuously, from her hair 
 to her pretty feet. Then, without a word he 
 walked with long, swift strides to the edge of 
 a great cliff that goes down like a wall into
 
 14 MAROZIA 
 
 the valley, where the peasants look like ants 
 from the heights, and with a leap he was gone 
 to his death. 
 
 " The girls did not make a song about Boris 
 to sing in the fields, but they made one about 
 Marozia a song that would burn a woman's 
 ears if she heard it."
 
 II 
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER
 
 II 
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER 
 
 IN Pegora village there was much merry- 
 making and lightness of heart, for the day 
 had been a feast day, a time of joviality, 
 much thin red, or white wine, native to the 
 country, had been drunk in the cafes ; but 
 little harm had resulted from the tippling, 
 because it takes many bottles of that un- 
 generous liquid to warm a man's blood to the 
 quarrelsome point. 
 
 Now, the night had come down, warm and 
 rather pleasant for folks who wanted to be 
 abroad. Tall, thin, gaunt men and women 
 of the humbler peasant classes loitered about, 
 taking life easily for the time. They had a 
 hard life as a rule, with plenty of work, poor 
 pay, and very little food, and that of the 
 coarsest kind ; and who could blame them if 
 they made the most of a holiday when it 
 came their way ? Their holidays were not 
 
 17 B
 
 18 MAROZIA 
 
 expensive affairs, They usually came from 
 their rude cabins leading a donkey laden with 
 fruit or vegetables, a donkey for the most part 
 as thin and as gaunt as themselves. 
 
 The wife usually tramped behind the donkey, 
 and often carried a small pannier full of eggs 
 upon her back, whilst the lads and lasses 
 carried anything else the family might have 
 to sell. 
 
 As for food, why, that was taken with them 
 always as a matter of course. It was madness 
 to spend the little money they had to toil 
 so hard to obtain on mere eatables. A loaf 
 or two of home-made black bread, a cake of 
 cheese made from goats' milk, an onion or 
 two for soup, and a skin of wine with a little 
 dried fruit filled all their needs unless, perhaps, 
 they had a wedding to attend. Then a pah* 
 of fowls and a little dried goats' flesh was 
 added to the store ; but this did not happen 
 often. 
 
 The roads had been dry and dusty, and this 
 had made the tramp into the village anything 
 but an unmixed blessing. Then had followed 
 the marketing, with its almost endless chaffer- 
 ing, for there are few persons even in the 
 East who can bargain more closely than a 
 Pegorian housewife. The spending of a shilling 
 in the market-place will call forth a volcano 
 of angry words, sighs, abuses, groans, threats,
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER 19 
 
 and sundry remarks regarding the parentage 
 of buyers and sellers, that are far more pungent 
 than polite. 
 
 But as soon as business is concluded, then 
 come the dance and song, the wine- cup and 
 the story. Then the old men sit about and 
 talk of the past, the young ones get the lasses 
 away to talk of the future, whilst the matrons 
 talk, as matrons will the world over, of the 
 joys and sorrows of mothering. 
 
 The folks would commence to stream home- 
 wards an hour or two before the dawn, so 
 that they might be in time for the next day's 
 work, but to-night, it is pleasure first and 
 sorrow later. 
 
 There is plenty of music of a kind, the 
 shrill music that the reed pipes make, and 
 there is much singing as the young persons 
 go about hand-in-hand. Here and there groups 
 of a dozen couples dance the kissing dance, 
 which brings forth much laughter and stamp- 
 ing of feet, the young matrons standing by 
 calling out chafrmgly to the maids, bidding 
 them not to be too coy. 
 
 It is against the laws of etiquette for a 
 matron to take part in this dance, because 
 the kissing that comes with the swing round 
 is apt to make young husbands jealous, and 
 a quarrel, followed quickly by a knife stab, is 
 liable to spoil the pleasures of a whole village,
 
 20 MAROZIA 
 
 where so many meet who are related by blood 
 or by marriage. 
 
 The night is well upon its way, and there 
 has been no quarrelling. Suddenly down the 
 street comes a party of three horsemen, all 
 armed. They had ridden far and fast, so it 
 would seem, if one might judge by the con- 
 dition of their horses, which, though jaded, 
 show by their points to an experienced eye 
 that they are well bred. 
 
 The dancers in the street draw back, and 
 allow the wayfarers to pass on, and many 
 curious eyes follow them until they draw 
 bridle in front of Bresco's wine-shop. 
 
 Now, Bresco is the most important man 
 in the village. He is the chief vintner, and, 
 besides, he owns three farms and a fine 
 vineyard, and sends away much wine in little 
 wooden kegs to foreign parts every year. He 
 is a warm man, every one knows that, and 
 his one daughter is much sought after by the 
 military officers who love to swagger about, 
 curling their moustaches and clinking their 
 spurs, ready to thrust a quarrel upon any one 
 who might happen to cross them. 
 
 It is Bresco himself who comes running 
 out to meet these belated guests, and as he 
 leads the horses into the inner courtyard around 
 which his hostel is built like so many boxes 
 around a hollow square, he eyes the newcomers
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER 21 
 
 sharply, for father Bresco had a sharp nose 
 for a secret, and for an intrigue, and he has 
 been sorely puzzled to make up his mind 
 these two days past concerning a woman who 
 has been staying at his hostel as a guest, a 
 woman who dresses and talks and eats like a 
 peasant of the better class, and yet has a way 
 at times of looking at him as if he, Bresco, 
 the most important man for leagues around, 
 was only a clod of inanimate dirt. 
 
 He had caught that look more than once, 
 and it had wounded his vanity ; even whilst 
 it set those sharp wits of his guessing whether 
 or not her peasant's dress might be a disguise. 
 He had hinted as much to his daughter, but 
 that damsel had bidden him rather sharply 
 to keep his eyes from the beautiful face and 
 handsome figure of the guest. 
 
 "What is it to thee," the girl had asked, 
 " who she is, or what she is, so long as she pays, 
 and pays well ? " And Bresco, who stood in 
 awe of this daughter's biting tongue, had gone 
 about his business grumbling not a little. 
 Now, here were other mysterious strangers, 
 coming from heaven knows where, on the 
 Lord only knew what errand, coming on a 
 feast night, too ; and Bresco swore by his own 
 particular saint that he believed there was 
 something in it, and where there were secrets 
 there was usually money, if a man only had
 
 22 MAROZIA 
 
 the wit to know how to lay hands upon it. 
 And Bresco loved money even more than he 
 loved prying into other people's business, so 
 he watched as an old fox will watch a rabbit 
 warren. He soon saw that there was a secret 
 understanding between the man who appeared 
 to be the leader of the new arrivals and the 
 woman who was the guest of the hostel. 
 
 The newcomers did not seem to want to join 
 in the merrymaking of the villagers, though 
 the woman had not been backward in that 
 matter during the day. She had even entered 
 into the kissing dance, and had struck up a 
 flirtation with Petro, the blacksmith, who was 
 not only the best smith outside of Belgrade, 
 but as handsome a man as a woman might 
 wish to pass a pleasant hour with, though over- 
 hasty in his temper, and given to quarrelling 
 for small causes. 
 
 Petro, the smith, was in the caf< when the 
 daughter of the house came to him and asked 
 him if he would examine the horses the 
 travellers had been riding. 
 
 " It is a saint's day," answered Petro sulkily, 
 for he had cherished the hope that he might 
 find an opportunity to exchange a few more 
 words with the handsome stranger, for where 
 a woman was concerned he was as weak as 
 water. 
 
 " It is a saint's day," muttered he ; " let the
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER 23 
 
 horses wait until to-morrow ; they will be all 
 the better for a night's rest." 
 
 " Oh, a saint's day," mimicked the vintner's 
 daughter. "Very well, I must find some 
 gipsy tinker to do the work for the lady." 
 
 "The lady! What lady?" 
 
 " Why, stupid, the one who is staying here. 
 She wants to purchase one of those horses if 
 they are sound, and she sent me to you to 
 examine them for her. She said : * Go and 
 ask that shoeing smith with the handsome 
 face if he will look at the horses for me before 
 I make a purchase,' but as your conscience is 
 so tender I must get other help I suppose. 
 You must not fall out with the saint, 
 Petro." 
 
 " May the devil run away with you and the 
 saints too ! Why did you not give me the 
 woman's message ? " 
 
 " But the saint, Petro ; think of the dear 
 saint," scoffed the lass. 
 
 " A live woman is better than a dead saint 
 any day," grinned Petro. 
 
 " Tell her I will look at the horses at once. 
 Has she any particular fancy do you know ? " 
 
 "Yes; she said she like the grey, and its 
 price also suited her. If the animal is sound 
 she will buy it." 
 
 "Ah, there she is at the door now. We 
 will go to her at once," said Petro.
 
 24 MAROZIA 
 
 " Think of the saints, Petro," gibed the girl. 
 
 " Think of the devil," growled the smith. 
 " You have an asp under your tongue, girl." 
 
 "So has every woman, but it is not every day 
 she finds a fool to sting," was the mocking 
 rejoinder. 
 
 The smith examined the horses, and the 
 woman bought the grey, and then she asked 
 Petro to remove the shoes so that she might 
 have the animal re-shod on the morrow. He 
 began to grumble, but when she offered to 
 hold the lantern for him he consented, and 
 went off to get his tools. He took longer 
 over that job than he had ever been known 
 to take since he was an unskilled boy, and 
 when the handsome guest came into the hostel 
 she was almost bursting with merriment, and 
 her eyes were dancing with mischief, and 
 something that she whispered into the ear of 
 the vintner's daughter caused that buxom lass 
 to explode with mirth. 
 
 Having done this, the unknown made her 
 way to her own apartment. She carried a 
 horseshoe in her hand, which she had told 
 Petro she would hang in her bed-chamber for 
 luck. But as soon as she had barred her door 
 she drew a small screw-driver from her pocket, 
 and, placing the horseshoe upon the table, 
 examined it carefully. A little groove ran 
 round the shoe, and here and there in the
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER 25 
 
 groove she saw the heads of screws. These 
 she deftly withdrew, proving that this was no 
 new trick of hers. 
 
 As the last screw came out the horse- 
 shoe fell apart ; it was made of two pieces, 
 beautifully fitted together, and between the 
 iron layers lay a letter deftly coiled. She 
 opened it with trembling, eager fingers her 
 big, luminous eyes shining with excitement 
 as she did so, and her full bosom rising and 
 falling under her peasant's bodice. 
 
 As soon as her eyes fell upon the contents 
 her whole face changed. Her cheeks grew 
 ashen white, her nostrils closed and expanded 
 with the force of her breathing. She rent the 
 letter to many fragments, and threw it upon 
 the floor, and ground the pieces with her heels. 
 
 " The coward ! " she gasped ; " the miser- 
 able, pitiful coward ! He fears to come and 
 meet me, because some of the Court spies 
 have been coupling my name with his in the 
 ears of the King." 
 
 She picked up the pieces of paper from the 
 floor and weighed them in the hollow of her 
 hand weighed them coldly and critically. 
 
 " They are light," she mused, " very light, 
 as light as the love of a craven. He did 
 not think of me did not think of my danger, 
 did not care what risks I ran I who risked 
 everything for love."
 
 26 MAROZIA 
 
 Then she laughed, and, drawing a miniature 
 from her bosom, held it over the flame of 
 the lamp until it was scorched into shape- 
 lessness. It was a portrait of one of the 
 King's Guard. 
 
 Once again she weighed the torn paper in 
 her hand. The colour had come back to 
 her cheeks, she was dusky red with wrath. 
 " The coward ! The coward ! to fear to keep 
 the appointment he himself had sued for on 
 his knees ; and let me run the risk ; let me 
 put my neck in a noose, let me give my 
 enemies at Court a chance to tell yet another 
 tale to the King. Well, he tried to make 
 me play the wanton ; he shall see how Marozia 
 plays the Queen." 
 
 She stood with knitted brow for a while, 
 musing. " The fool ! Does he think I will 
 let him live to boast to his boon companions 
 over his wine that he fooled Marozia the 
 Queen, that he made me await his pleasure 
 in a hamlet like any courtesan ? Does he 
 think he has me in his power to play with ? " 
 
 Slowly she burnt each tiny scrap of paper; 
 then opening her windows she let the ashes 
 blow away. 
 
 Standing in the courtyard below was Petro, 
 the smith. She saw him, and laughed. 
 
 " I am not the only fool in the village 
 to-night," said she, and closed the window.
 
 THE HORSESHOE LETTER 27 
 
 Half an hour later she stood in the same 
 room dressed like a Queen ; her peasant's 
 costume lay in a huddled heap upon the 
 floor. 
 
 " Now," said she to the vintner's daughter, 
 " send the men to me who came here on 
 horseback an hour ago, and bid them make 
 all speed." 
 
 The girl went hot-foot on her errand, and 
 with all speed the men came at the bidding 
 of the Queen. Wonderfully lovely she looked 
 standing there in that dingy, little room. The 
 men bent the knee in silence. 
 
 In curt, cold tones she told them that a 
 deadly insult had been put upon her, and 
 she named the officer of the King's Guard. 
 
 With one accord their hands went to their 
 sword-belts, and the blades flashed out. 
 
 " I can trust you," she said, and as she 
 said the words she smiled upon the men, and 
 they answered her in low, hoarse tones. 
 
 " He shall die before the sun sets three 
 times," answered the leader. " We will take 
 fresh horses and go on that business now." 
 
 " It is well," answered Marozia, " and 
 wherever you ride tell it boldly and openly 
 that Marozia the Queen is in the village of 
 Pegora amongst her own peasants, sharing 
 their joys at the feast as she is willing to 
 share in their sorrows. Tell that also in the
 
 28 MAROZIA 
 
 ears of the King, but not until you have 
 done your business with the Captain of the 
 Guard." 
 
 The men saluted in silence ; in silence they 
 rode away, and in silence they did her errand 
 to the bitter end. When they had gone, 
 Marozia the Queen went forth in the moon- 
 light, along the narrow street ; and in the 
 market-place the peasants crowded round to 
 kiss the hem of her garment, and do her 
 homage, loving her because she had come 
 amongst them to share their innocent joys, 
 and for her sake they blessed the name of 
 her lord, the King but none of them saw 
 the hollow in the horseshoe, not even Petro, 
 the smith.
 
 Ill 
 
 SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK
 
 Ill 
 
 SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK 
 
 " JESU, what a man to be near the Queen ! 
 Did'st ever see such a figure in all your mortal 
 life, Secckin?" 
 
 " Not I, Velo. Art quite sure 'tis a man ? 
 It looks more like an ape to my way of 
 thinking." 
 
 " Better speak below thy breath, neighbour," 
 whispered Bernados, the tailor, who was a 
 discreet man, and timorous ; " better speak 
 below thy breath, for if half what I hear 
 my patrons say concerning this misshapen 
 personage be true, his hand will fly to his 
 hilt for a small matter." 
 
 Velo, the contrabandist, drew his tall figure 
 to its full height, and lifted his bold head 
 higher. 
 
 "A fig for him and his hilt," he cried, 
 " there are others in the world who care as 
 little as he for a little blood spilling. You are 
 overtame, friend Bernados. As for me, I 
 
 31
 
 32 MAROZIA 
 
 lower my breath in the market-place for no 
 man, either King or King's lackey." 
 
 " Well, here comes one who can tell us 
 all we want to know; one who is as fearless 
 as thyself, good Velo," was the tailor's mild 
 reply. 
 
 Velo turned his eyes in the direction the 
 tailor had indicated with a jerk of his thumb, 
 and his keen eyes twinkled merrily. 
 
 " Aye," he said, " this is a man if you like. 
 Now, if I were Marozia the Queen this is the 
 sort of man I would save my sighs and smiles 
 for." And he stepped forward with out- 
 stretched hand to greet the newcomer, crying, 
 " How is it with you, Golganoff? " 
 
 The new arrival was a man of about the 
 middle height, a man nearly five-and-forty, in 
 the flood-tide of his manhood when a sound 
 man is at his best, and looks his best. His 
 fair, curly hair was touched here and there 
 with a streak of silver ; his yellow moustache, 
 that drooped like two horns, swept around his 
 mouth, and reached far below the line of his 
 resolute chin ; also showed a white hair here 
 and there. His head was rather small, but 
 it was poised upon a magnificent neck that 
 rose from between the broad shoulders like a 
 column of bronze. He was deep in the chest, 
 narrow in the flank, clean limbed ; an athlete 
 trained to arms. One of the few survivors of
 
 33 
 
 a class of men who hired themselves out to 
 go anywhere, and do anything that a fighting 
 man might do without dishonour. 
 
 Only a few months back, I, who chronicle 
 these things, sat in a little cabaret and shared 
 a stoup of wine with him. He had never 
 performed a menial task in his life, neither 
 had his father, or his father's father for many 
 generations. Fighting was his trade; guard- 
 ing some diplomat going upon some dangerous 
 mission, escorting a merchant over the brigand- 
 infected mountains ; guarding a man's home 
 while the head of the house went a-journey- 
 ing ; acting as guard-of-honour to maid or 
 matron, to ensure his charge proper respect 
 and due courtesy in the streets, or upon the 
 roads ; carrying a message one day for a king, 
 the next doing the same for some bandit 
 true, always to the death, to the man who was 
 for the time being his employer; slow to 
 loosen his blade in its scabbard, slower still 
 to put it back when once unsheathed ; sure 
 of himself, and therefore sure of the respect 
 that was due to him ; never arrogant to the 
 humblest, never fawning to the greatest a 
 man from the crown of his curly head to the 
 heels of his feet. 
 
 He was dressed as the men of his order 
 always dress. A small, crimson skull-cap 
 sat jauntily on his curly head. His richly-
 
 34 MAROZIA 
 
 embroidered blue jacket was of the finest 
 cloth. His shirt, open at the neck to allow 
 the wind and sun to play upon his full, round 
 throat, was of snowy whiteness. His kilt, 
 reaching to his knees, was of deep crimson. 
 His knees were bare, but the calves of his 
 legs were covered with short, white stockings, 
 crossed and recrossed by leather bands. His 
 feet were encased in shoes of black Russian 
 leather turned up at the points. Around his 
 middle he wore a belt of black leather, in 
 which was stuck a pair of silver-mounted 
 Turkish pistols, and a long ivory-hilted dagger, 
 that had been old when the Crusaders were 
 gathering in Europe. A long, straight blade 
 hung on his thigh, and all men knew that 
 money would not purchase any of those 
 weapons. They were heirlooms, handed down 
 from father to son, and each in his turn made 
 a point of keeping them unstained by anything 
 that smacked of dishonourable doings. 
 
 His sword was this man's charter all over 
 the Near East. When he had to take an oath 
 he did not swear by the saints, he did not put 
 his hand upon the cross or upon a Bible, he 
 simply laid his hand upon his blade and 
 said : " I swear ; " and from Constantinople 
 to Belgrade no man, either Turk, Jew, or 
 Christian, asked for more. 
 
 Such was Golganoff, the man who clasped
 
 SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK 35 
 
 hands with Velo, the contrabandist, in the 
 busy market-place of Sofia. 
 
 " Tell me, comrade, who is that misshapen 
 oaf that looks like an ape, and is always 
 dangling near the Royal woman ? " 
 
 " Steady, friend Velo ; that tongue of thine 
 will let the life out of thy ribs one of these 
 fine days," laughed GolganofF. " What man ? " 
 he continued, "is there not enough trouble 
 the year round to give thee thy fill of fight- 
 ing, that you must run hare-footed to seek 
 it?" 
 
 "May the devil sit down to sup with me 
 this night, comrade, if I do not think this 
 bow-backed stranger has bewitched all the 
 men in Sofia. Whenever or wherever I 
 speak of him, I am warned to be careful. 
 At one moment it is the landlord of my 
 cabaret, who puts his finger to his lip and 
 cries : ' Sh-ss, sh-ss, good Velo ; not so loud, 
 I pray thee, for thy safety's sake ; ' or it is 
 the pretty wench who fills my wine cup from 
 the leather bottle, who turns pale and 
 whispers : ' Have a care, good Velo ; have 
 a care ; ' or this tailor here, who trembles 
 so when I speak of the hunchback that his 
 clothes fit him only where they happen to 
 touch his carcass ; and now, to crown it all, 
 you GolganofF, you of all men, take up the 
 tale. Who the devil is the man ? Is he
 
 36 MAROZIA 
 
 another lover of Marozia's ? If so, she must 
 think a crooked stick is good enough to 
 beat her husband with. I could understand 
 her madness with that Hungarian lover of 
 hers for he was fit to fill a woman's eye 
 whether he went afoot or on horseback." 
 
 " Well, Velo, here he comes ; but if I had 
 to quarrel with either, I would rather it were 
 this man than the bow-backed one." 
 
 A man, riding an immense black horse, 
 came pacing slowly through the market, he 
 was of great stature, dressed in the half- 
 barbaric splendour of the Hungarian nobility. 
 He made an imposing figure. 
 
 "Marozia the Beautiful has two sorts to 
 choose from," grinned Velo. " I have heard 
 it said that when a woman gets tired of the 
 beautiful she will dote on the hideous, and 
 it is a far cry from this splendid Hungarian 
 to Sethin Bow-back." 
 
 A lot of other folks were talking much as 
 Velo had been doing, for no one could under- 
 stand why Marozia the Queen allowed a 
 deformed man to play the lover. She who 
 always seemed so fastidious in matters of 
 personal appearance in all her amours. 
 
 " Ha, ha, ha ! " tittered an old hag to a 
 crowd of girls, "a sour apple suits a jaded 
 palate better than a sweet one sometimes, and 
 Marozia would ransack the world for a whim."
 
 SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK 37 
 
 " Yes, yes, any man is better than no man," 
 sniggered fat Annette, the fish-hawker, and 
 she leaned upon her empty basket. 
 
 " Is that why you married such a lout as 
 thy man, then?" demanded the hag. And 
 all the girls laughed. 
 
 Just then Marozia drove through the market- 
 place, leaning back in her open carriage. She 
 surveyed the scene with the insolence born 
 of power; possibly she guessed what the 
 peasants were saying concerning her, and so 
 gave them scorn for scorn. Her eyes were 
 half-closed, and a sleepy smile played round 
 her red mouth. 
 
 " She is like a cat sitting in the sun," said 
 the hag to the fishwife. 
 
 Sethin Bow - back of Montenegro came 
 down the street a minute later, and seeing 
 Golganoff with Velo, the contrabandist, 
 beckoned the former to follow him. 
 
 " Will you take service with that crooked 
 stick ? " demanded Velo. 
 
 " If he pays, why not ? " was the curt 
 reply. 
 
 In a wine-shop Sethin of Montenegro drew 
 GolganofF on one side. " Are you a free man 
 at present ? " he asked. 
 
 " For a month I am free, then I journey to 
 Philippopolis to fill a promise." 
 
 " Then for a month will you be my man ? "
 
 38 MAROZIA 
 
 " If it is in the way of my trade, yes." 
 
 " It is." 
 
 " Then I am your man ; no need to tell you 
 my price, you know it." 
 
 " I will gladly pay the price. Now swear." 
 
 Golganoff lifted his sword and touched it 
 with his lips. " I swear to be your man," he 
 said simply, and rose up and slightly bent 
 his head as to a master. 
 
 The hunchback motioned him to a seat. 
 " You know Marozia the Queen ? " 
 
 " Who does not ? " was the laconic answer. 
 
 " Good, watch over her night and day. 
 Go to her now ; she expects you." 
 
 " Do I serve Marozia, or do I serve you ? " 
 
 "If you serve me you serve her." 
 
 Golganoff smiled, the smile of a large 
 experience in human affairs. " Perhaps now," 
 he answered ; " but when a woman is in the 
 question it may be otherwise a week hence, 
 and I would know whom I serve." 
 
 " You are my man." 
 
 " Very good." 
 
 Golganoff rose up and went about his 
 trade. He became as a shadow to Marozia 
 the Beautiful ; when she walked he was not 
 three paces behind her ; when she rode, he 
 rode half a horse's length in the rear, and 
 Marozia made much of him though she had 
 plenty of other matters on her hands.
 
 SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK 39 
 
 One day the brilliant, haughty, stalwart, 
 Hungarian lived in her smiles, the next it 
 was Sethin Bow-back, the Montenegrian. 
 
 " She plays with fire and knows it," laughed 
 Golganoff to himself; "one man is a foil to 
 the other, and for my own part I think she 
 has other fish in the pan, or else she is think- 
 ing more of politics than of love." 
 
 Marozia's residence was an old-world place 
 in the hills, just out of the city ; a dwelling 
 with a balcony running all along its front. 
 Roses climbed up that balcony, and blushed 
 in the sunlight. Scandalmongers said that 
 more than roses climbed up by moonlight, 
 and had better cause to blush. 
 
 It seemed as if both the lovers thought so, 
 for the Hungarian gave Velo, the contra- 
 bandist, who had entered his service, orders 
 to watch that balcony, and Sethin of Monten- 
 egro gave the same order to Golganoff. Each 
 lover suspected the other, and each was bent 
 on revenge. 
 
 On the third night of watching each man 
 reported to his master that the Queen was 
 faithless in her love, for a man had scaled 
 the balcony leading to the Queen's apart- 
 ments, and had been met and welcomed by 
 Marozia the Fickle. Velo and Golganoff had 
 both witnessed the episode from different 
 points of vantage, and neither knew that
 
 40 MAROZIA 
 
 the other was playing watch-dog on the 
 balcony. 
 
 With fierce wrath in his heart the Hun- 
 garian snatched up his sword and, bidding 
 Velo follow him, rode in mad haste to the 
 Queen's residence. Little he cared how he 
 might set the fires of scandal blazing ; a man 
 tricked in his love thinks the whole world 
 faithless until he cools. The hunchback was 
 as furious as his rival when he received his 
 henchman's warning. 
 
 " This must end to-night, Golganoff," he 
 said. " She blows hot and blows cold, but 
 if she is not for me, that big beast from 
 Hungary shall not have her." 
 
 Tucking his sword under his arm, with his 
 man at his heels, he made his way with all 
 speed to the balcony that led to the bed- 
 chamber of Marozia the Beautiful. And 
 then the rivals met, one coming from the 
 northern end of the gardens, one from the 
 southern. 
 
 No words passed between them, each man 
 flung away his cloak and scabbard, and in a 
 moment the night air thrilled to the strokes 
 of steel on steel. The two men-servants 
 acting as seconds, stood by with bared blades 
 in their hands ready to fly at each other's 
 throats in spite of their former friendship, 
 and neither would have thought any the
 
 SETHIN, THE HUNCHBACK 41 
 
 worse of the other for it, if it had come to 
 a death struggle between them, though as 
 soon as their terms of servitude was ended 
 they would be good friends again. Such 
 things came in the way of their day's work. 
 
 Marozia heard the sound of trampling feet, 
 and the hiss and click of blade meeting blade* 
 and came to the balcony in a long, loose 
 robe, her glorious wealth of hair falling in a 
 waving mass down her back, and with her 
 came a man, young, and well made. 
 
 He would have leant over the balcony to 
 watch the fight, but she put one white-robed 
 arm around him and drew him back into 
 the shadow. " Not yet," she whispered ; " let 
 them go on to the end. I have four men 
 posted in readiness. They will come when 
 I call." 
 
 Dpfvn below the fight waxed fiercer and 
 fiercer. The hunchback had not the strength 
 nor the length of arm of his adversary, but 
 he had the cunning of the devil, as Velo said 
 in the cafe afterwards. Every feint, every 
 trick of swordcraft he knew, and in the end 
 the Hungarian fell over on his side, run 
 through the heart. Then Marozia clapped her 
 white hands, and four men rushed out upon 
 the hunchback. 
 
 Velo was kneeling by his employer's body, 
 and took no part in what followed, but Gol-
 
 42 MAROZIA 
 
 ganoff rushed into the melee, backing the 
 hunchback with all his skill and power. But 
 four fresh men to one nearly spent, and one 
 sound man, is no match in s^ord play, and 
 the end came quickly. Then down from the 
 balcony came Marozia the Beautiful, and with 
 her Mabon the King. 
 
 When the hunchback saw who it was with 
 the woman, his quick wit told him that both 
 he and the Hungarian had been fooled by 
 a woman's wiles, and, lifting himself upon 
 his elbow with the last atom of strength, he 
 threw a curse at her, calling her by a name 
 that the worst woman loathes to hear. But 
 Marozia only smiled. Velo attended to Gol- 
 ganofFs wounds, and carried him away to 
 nurse him back to life and health, but the 
 two masters were past nursing. On the 
 balcony in the moonlight Marozia the Queen 
 whispered to Mabon, her lord. 
 
 "Tut, tut, my King. Why fall out with 
 my methods since two who would have torn 
 the crown from your head and mine are past 
 all scheming ? " And he, the weakest of all 
 her victims, let his head slide on to her bosom 
 whilst she toyed with his hair, and cooed of 
 loving and trusting.
 
 IV 
 FN THE VALE OF ROSES
 
 IV 
 IN THE VALE OF ROSES 
 
 " WHAT fat legs Martha has ! " 
 
 " Yes ; she would be almost as useful as a 
 mule in the wine-press." 
 
 "Ah, but look at Annetta; she has legs 
 like broom handles and feet like flat irons. 
 She may not be worth running after in the 
 dance, neighbour, but in the wine-press, oh ! 
 that is another matter. She will squeeze the 
 last drop out of a grape." 
 
 " Just turn your eyes on Presca ; she is a 
 well-made girl, if you like." 
 
 " Well-made ! Presca well-made ! Ho, ho ! 
 that is a good joke. Why, she is as heavy 
 and as clumsy as an ox ! " 
 
 " Well, and if she is heavy, what of that ? 
 She can tread the wine out of the grapes all 
 the better, can't she ? " 
 
 " Oh, no one said she could not crush a 
 grape with her big feet. I danced with her 
 at the last feast, and she trod on my feet until 
 
 45
 
 46 MAROZIA 
 
 I wished her at the devil. She could tread a 
 green melon flat. There is no shape about 
 your Presca, she is beef to the ankles." 
 
 The speakers were a group of peasant 
 youths who were watching a party of girls 
 treading out the wine in the old-fashioned 
 way from the grapes that the men and lads 
 tossed in the vat from time to time. The 
 girls could hear a good deal of the criticism, 
 most of which was merely intended as rough 
 banter, and when it came their time to talk, 
 they did not spare their tormentors ; and then 
 the old folks fell to chaffing the young men, 
 who looked sheepish under the whip of the 
 girls' pointed cynicism. 
 
 "Take your pigs to a better market next 
 time, my sons," shrilled an old woman ; " for 
 a lad's tongue cuts only the skin, but a maid's 
 tongue cuts to the bone." 
 
 "They'll find that out when they marry, 
 mother," cried a man who was passing with 
 a huge basket of grapes on his shoulder. 
 
 "Ah, is that you, Keppo? So you have 
 come back, have you ? What news have you 
 picked up, eh ? " Keppo had been afar, taking 
 tobacco to the merchants, which his master 
 had grown on his plantation. A crowd 
 gathered round to hear the traveller's tales. 
 
 " Didst hear anything concerning the com- 
 ing of Marozia ? " queried the hag. " It is in all
 
 IN THE VALE OF ROSES 47 
 
 men's mouths that she is to come to the Valley 
 of Roses, but for my part I will believe it when 
 I see her." 
 
 "Men talk the truth, then, for once," 
 responded Keppo. " Marozia the Beautiful 
 will be here by the time the roses are ready 
 for picking, and a gay company will come 
 with her. Many of her Court ladies are 
 coming to purchase their own attar of roses, 
 because they have a fancy to smell the 
 perfume first of all in the flower." 
 
 " When is Marozia the Queen to come here, 
 Keppo ? In how many days, think you ? " 
 
 " That is a question no man can answer," 
 replied Keppo. " Marozia never does as other 
 great ladies do. She may come riding here 
 any day now, for the roses are nearly ready, as 
 all the world knows. How heavy the air is 
 with the perfume," he continued, drawing in a 
 deep breath through his nostrils ; "surely there 
 can be no other place like our valley for sweet 
 smells." 
 
 " Pah ! " cried another man, spitting on the 
 ground, " a fig for the perfume of the valley. 
 Give me the cold breezes that blow from the 
 tops of the mountains yonder, and the strong 
 smell of the resinous pines. That is the 
 perfume for a man. You men of the vales 
 grow more and more like women every year. 
 No wonder the Turks come and harry the
 
 48 MAROZIA 
 
 houses in the valleys with fire and sword at 
 their pleasure." 
 
 An angry murmur broke out from the 
 ring of valley folk at this, but Keppo, who 
 loved peace, simply stilled it by saying : 
 " Have you heard that Marozia's new lover 
 is a Turk?" 
 
 This announcement caused a great com- 
 motion. 
 
 " A Turk ! " cried one. " The woman 
 would make love to the evil one himself 
 if it suited her whim." 
 
 "She is bewitched surely," spoke up another. 
 
 " Anything in the shape of a man will suit 
 Marozia," jeered the hag. 
 
 "Perhaps she is up to some more of her 
 political tricks," ventured Keppo. "No one 
 but Marozia knows where her loving ends and 
 her scheming begins." 
 
 " Who may the Turk be ? " demanded a 
 man who had not hitherto spoken. 
 
 " They call him Ismay Pascha," was Keppo's 
 answer. 
 
 " It must be a lie," shouted a thick-set, 
 powerfully - built man who had joined the 
 group of workmen quietly, and had remained 
 unnoticed. This was Sarakunoff, the famous 
 insurgent, one of the fiercest and most 
 desperate men in the East. He had been a 
 " Wolfs Head," an outlaw, for years. Yet
 
 IN THE VALE OF ROSES 49 
 
 he came and went much as he pleased, 
 for every one knew that, besides his other 
 arms, he never moved without a bomb in 
 his jacket pocket a bomb that would kill 
 anything and everything within a radius of 
 thirty yards from where it exploded. 
 
 "You think it a lie, Sarakunoff? Tell 
 me why Marozia has done many things that 
 no man would credit until she had done 
 them?" 
 
 Sarakunoff stood with heavy brows knitted 
 in savage thought. When he spoke he said : 
 " This man, Ismay Pascha, is the dog who 
 led the troop last summer when they swept 
 the village of Reno of every living thing, 
 man, woman, and child. He may think he 
 is safe in Bulgaria, but he will have to pay 
 for that Macedonian blood yet, and Marozia 
 is a Christian woman. She would never let 
 an infidel dog be her lover." 
 
 " I have told the tale as I heard it," said 
 Keppo sulkily, " and with my own eyes I have 
 seen her with the man. If they are not lovers, 
 they both know how to act a part well enough 
 to deceive all men. She smiles on him, and 
 he eats her with his eyes." 
 
 Sarakunoff spat on the ground and, turning, 
 walked away as silently as he had come. 
 
 " If Marozia and her Turkish lover comes to 
 the valley for the gathering of roses," whispered
 
 50 MAROZIA 
 
 a man, " Sarakunoff will not be far away. He 
 has a vendetta against that Turk, and, as we 
 all know, he fears nothing." 
 
 " Marozia cannot love the Turk over-much," 
 put in another, " or surely she would not bring 
 him here where Macedonians come." 
 
 " For my part," growled another, " I love 
 the infidels as little as any one, but, for all 
 that, if Sarakunoff must kill this one I wish he 
 would do it somewhere else. We are too close 
 to the borders of Turkish territory for the 
 killing to go unavenged. Why, we can see 
 the Turkish fort on the hills from here on a 
 fine day. I pray the saints Marozia may not 
 bring us more trouble. AVe have had our 
 share, neighbours." 
 
 At these ominous words the women who 
 were suckling their babies clasped the infants 
 closer in their arms and looked fearfully round, 
 for the shadow of the Bashi Bazouks was 
 always on their hearts. 
 
 The next day Keppo's tale was verified, for 
 Marozia the Queen, with half a dozen of her 
 ladies, rode gaily into the Valley of Roses, and 
 on her bridle hand rode Ismay Pascha. His 
 eyes were heavily lidded, his features massive, 
 a remorseless mouth, shaded by a thick, brown 
 moustache, was the dominant feature of his 
 face. His big hooked nose made him look 
 like a bird of prey, and his deeds did not
 
 IN THE VALE OF ROSES 51 
 
 belie his looks. He rode a fine horse, and 
 handled it superbly. 
 
 In and out, from one rose garden to another, 
 down the length of the valley rode the gay 
 cavalcade, and the Turk plainly saw that the 
 Bulgar peasants hated him, for they were very 
 near akin to the Macedonians. He let them 
 see just as plainly that he despised them. 
 
 " They don't love you over-much," Marozia 
 whispered to the man, while they halted 
 their horses in the shade of a clump of trees 
 at noon. 
 
 " No," he said grimly ; " but they fear me." 
 
 "You would rather have fear than love," 
 she murmured, letting those marvellous eyes 
 of hers search his face. 
 
 He caught her eyes with his own and held 
 them for a long, long time. Then he leant 
 close and whispered : " I must have love or 
 hate; anything in between is too tame for a 
 man of my nature." 
 
 " You do not believe in mere friendship ? " 
 she queried, playing with one of her gauntlets 
 as she spoke. 
 
 " Between very old or very young people, 
 yes," he made answer. . 
 
 " But not between " she commenced, 
 
 and bit her words off sharply. 
 
 " Not between you and I, my Queen," he 
 whispered hoarsely, finishing the sentence for
 
 52 MAROZIA 
 
 her. It must be love or hate, either you love 
 me, or you have led me on to laugh at me." 
 
 " In which case " she began. 
 
 " In which case," he said, taking the words 
 from her mouth, " I shall hate you with my 
 whole heart." 
 
 "You do not mince your phrases," she 
 cried. 
 
 " Why should I ? " was his retort. " I am a 
 soldier." 
 
 " If you fight as you woo there is no 
 fear of your enemies misunderstanding you," 
 cried she. 
 
 " Nor the woman I woo and want, either," 
 was his reply. " You understand me, my 
 Queen?" 
 
 " Do you understand me ? " she demanded. 
 
 He drew the slack of his bridle-rein slowly 
 through his big, strong fingers, and smiled. 
 "Is there a man born who understands all 
 the moods of a beautiful and bewitching 
 woman?" he asked. 
 
 She flicked him lightly across the hands 
 with her riding-whip, and, meeting his gaze, 
 gave him a long, slow, dreamy smile that 
 brought the impulsive cplour in a flood to his 
 sun-tanned cheeks. So they sat and fenced 
 with each other, coring nothing that a hundred 
 pairs of curious ej'es were upon them, and the 
 peasant girls plucking.. blooms amidst the rose
 
 IN THE VALE OF ROSES 53 
 
 bushes whispered to one another and laughed, 
 whilst the old hags sniggered and made mock 
 of the name of Mabon the King. But 
 the men looked round them continually, and 
 spoke with bated breath of Sarakunoff, the 
 insurgent leader, and his vendetta. So the 
 days came and went, and the smouldering 
 scandal spread until it blazed, and folks 
 asked one another where it would end. But 
 Sarakunoff made no sign. 
 
 The roses were all plucked, and the dis- 
 tilleries were busy. Marozia and her ladies 
 went fishing for trout in the river that came 
 brawling down from the mountains. Hot as 
 was the day, the water was cold, for it was 
 fed by the snow that was still melting in the 
 ravines of the Perrin Mountains. The ladies 
 romped like school girls out of bounds. 
 Carrying nets attached to long handles, they 
 scooped up the spotted beauties as they darted 
 from their hiding-places under the eaves of 
 the small rocks that lay strewn about the 
 shallow stream. 
 
 To them came Ismay Pascha, and the Court 
 ladies discreetly drew away, leaving Marozia 
 the Queen alone with her tempestuous lover. 
 By-and-by he took the net from her hands 
 and tossed it down on the bank, and together 
 they sauntered amongst the olive trees, far 
 from the sight of the peasants' prying eyes.
 
 54 MAROZIA 
 
 Then Ismay Pascha came to a halt, and his 
 thick lips shook. 
 
 " Marozia," he said, " this butterfly sport 
 must end." 
 
 He would have taken her in his arms, but 
 she, lithe and quick as a leopard, evaded him. 
 He stood with a black frown upon his face, 
 gnawing his lips, clenching and unclench- 
 ing his hands spasmodically. He looked a 
 dangerous animal at that moment, dangerous 
 even for a queen to toy with. 
 
 But Marozia did not know what fear was. 
 Her head was thrown back, her hair coming 
 uncoiled fell down to her waist. Her eyes 
 were dancing with excitement, her breath 
 coming in quick, uneven gasps. 
 
 " You have used me for your sport," the 
 Pascha said thickly ; " but even a queen may 
 go too far." 
 
 He strode towards Marozia, and as he did 
 so, Sarakunoff, the insurgent, hurled himself 
 out of a clump of trees on top of him and 
 brought him down. The Turk was a play- 
 thing in the outlaw's hands, and, recognising 
 the futility of struggling he lay still. 
 
 Turning his eyes on Marozia he said with a 
 sneer, " So this is your love, is it ? " 
 
 " No ; this is my hate," she made answer. 
 She knelt and whispered a man's name in his 
 ear. " You remember him ? " she asked.
 
 IN THE VALE OF ROSES 55 
 
 The Turk smiled grimly. " Oh yes ; I had 
 him bow-strung two years ago." 
 
 " Yes ; I knew it. Well, he was my lover, 
 and for what you did to him I lured you 
 into this trap. Sarakunoff, I leave him to 
 you." 
 
 The outlaw closed his big hand on the 
 Pascha's throat with a firmer grasp. " Go 
 in peace, Queen Marozia," he said, " this man 
 is mine."
 
 V 
 
 PHILIPPOPOLTS was gay beyond its usual wont. 
 Men of many nationalities patrolled the ill-lit 
 streets of the ancient city. Most men who 
 had anything to lose were careful not to 
 wander about alone, for the place had an evil 
 reputation. 
 
 There were Greeks there who would slip 
 a knife up to the hilt between a pilgrim's 
 ribs for a small sum of money. There were 
 Armenians at every alley way who would 
 have small compunction about ending a person's 
 earthly troubles if the wage offered was large 
 enough to counterbalance the risk. Bravos 
 from Hungary, swarthy-faced, beetle-browed 
 fellows, with wondrous white teeth and big, 
 flashing, black eyes, lounged about ready to 
 take part in any person's quarrel, providing 
 there was a flask of wine and a few gold pieces 
 attached to the trouble. 
 
 Truculent-looking blades from Montenegro 
 59
 
 60 MAROZIA 
 
 swaggered about the streets, or lounged in 
 dimly-lit cafes ready for any mischief. Stern- 
 eyed Turks, with watchful eyes and silent 
 tongues, grouped themselves together, or kept 
 as much as possible to the well-lit parts of 
 the city, not being over-anxious to make a 
 start for Paradise in spite of the charms of 
 Houris. 
 
 They were merchants and men of consider- 
 able substance for the most part those Turks, 
 and bad men to fasten a quarrel upon. All 
 their lives had been spent close to the border, 
 and they knew what a small thing would 
 start a blaze of trouble when men were ripe 
 for it. 
 
 Most of them had heard the midnight call 
 to arms more than once, and had known what 
 it was to stand blade in hand in their own 
 doorways. Some of them, in times past, had 
 thrown bales of goods across doorways, and, 
 kneeling by open windows, had used their 
 long guns, muzzle-loading and mother-of-pearl 
 inlaid, upon mobs in the street. Curious old 
 guns they were, throwing a soft lead bullet 
 about as big as a man's thumb, a bullet that 
 usually opened out as soon as it hit a man, 
 making a wound which a copper penny would 
 scarce cover. 
 
 But profits were big on the border, and the 
 Turk was ready to run the risks for the sake
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 61 
 
 of the gains. Bulgarian military officers were 
 strongly in evidence in Philippopolis, splendid, 
 fellows, silent, hard as granite, bold, alert, con- 
 fident, neither seeking trouble nor stepping 
 aside too gingerly to avoid it. Good men, 
 these, for a brawler to let alone. 
 
 There were Servians in military uniforms 
 also, aping the airs and refinements of Paris. 
 Far too prone to clap a hand to a sword-hilt, 
 or to twist a moustache fiercely ; much given 
 to clicking spurs together, as they do in 
 Berlin after a long bout with lager beer- 
 bottles a poor lot, these Servians, quicker 
 with tongue than with steel, having a better 
 stomach for making a quarrel than for seeing 
 it out to the bitter end. 
 
 Of Jews there was no end Jew merchants, 
 Jew pedlars, Jew money-lenders, Jew touts and 
 guides. Jew horse-sellers and buyers. Here 
 and there an Austrian, arrogant, haughty, 
 over-bearing, thinking the world his and his 
 Emperor's ; a few Russians, easy-going, care- 
 less, and overfond of champagne and the dice 
 box easy fellows to get along with in trade 
 or pleasure. Women of many nationalities 
 flitted about, and each clung to the dress of 
 her native land. Many notables were in 
 Philippopolis, for although there was to be 
 no formal meetings, none at least that the 
 world knew anything about, yet it was a
 
 62 MAROZIA 
 
 matter of common knowledge that matters 
 relative to a great upheaval would in all 
 probability shape themselves this spring in 
 Philippopolis. Tzontchieff, the celebrated 
 military adviser and leader of the Macedonian 
 revolutionaries, was there ; so was the greatest 
 of their guerilla leaders, Boris Saraboff. Fight- 
 ing men and diplomats from Servia, Hungary, 
 Roumania, Macedonia, Austria, Russia, 
 Turkey, and Greece, were in evidence, and 
 more than one prince and princeling who had 
 hopes and aspirations in connection with 
 thrones. 
 
 And amidst all these came Marozia the 
 Beautiful, to make her own plots and mine 
 and countermine the plots of others and none 
 held her cheaply. Her clever brain and her 
 limitless courage and audacity were known 
 to all, for she had steered her barque amidst 
 stormy waters too well and too often for the 
 most skilful intriguers to overlook or despise 
 her. 
 
 It was well known that she would stop at 
 nothing to gain her ends. She would use 
 all her weapons mercilessly ; her wisdom, her 
 wit, her personal charm, her beauty all these 
 things she would throw into the balance in 
 the fight for power. 
 
 It was not her desire to see Bulgaria grow 
 bigger and stronger, and rumour had it that
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 63 
 
 there was just a possibility that pressure might 
 soon be brought upon Turkey to hand 
 Macedonia over to Bulgarian rule. In that 
 case, many argued that the next step would 
 be the absorption of Servia by Bulgaria, with 
 the triple states under one crown ; and right 
 well Marozia knew that neither she nor 
 Mabon, her lord, would be chosen by the 
 Bulgarian and Macedonian people to rule over 
 them. 
 
 It was early in the evening when two 
 officers approached the house of Stergoff, 
 the Jew, who had horses and carriages for 
 hire. They walked like men who fancied 
 they had business of importance on hand. 
 
 "Why is Marozia the Queen sending us 
 with dispatches to this outlying village ? " 
 whispered one. 
 
 His comrade shrugged his shoulders, 
 " Perhaps it is a dispatch of moment that 
 we convey ; possibly it is a love letter to one 
 of her many worshippers. One never knows 
 when one is in the service of Marozia. All 
 that I do know is that we have to get horses 
 and a carriage from this accursed Jew, and 
 he will rob us in the matter of charges I am 
 assured, for I have had dealings with him 
 before." 
 
 They rapped loudly at the Jew's door with 
 the pommels of their swords, and swore
 
 64 MAROZIA 
 
 savagely because it did not fly open on 
 the instant. The door opened at last, and 
 a man in the prime of life appeared, carrying 
 a lantern, which he held so that he could 
 scrutinise his visitors very effectively whilst 
 screening his own face. This was a necessary 
 precaution, for of all men in Philippopolis a 
 Jew had to be on guard against violence. 
 The Turks loathed them, the Greeks hated 
 them, the other sections of the community 
 despised them and despoiled them, and yet 
 the Jews flourished and grew rich. 
 
 Having satisfied himself that his visitors had 
 come upon an honest errand, the Hebrew 
 invited them to enter his dwelling. Then he 
 became all obsequiousness. Stroking his beard, 
 he asked their Excellencies what commands of 
 theirs he the most unworthy of his tribe 
 might have the honour of carrying into effect. 
 
 " We want four good horses, a carriage, and 
 a postillion," said one of the officers brusquely, 
 breaking in upon the Jew's flow of speech. 
 And he added : " The horses must be good." 
 
 The Jew raised his hands, palm outwards, 
 above his head. 
 
 " Horses ! Did their Excellencies demand 
 horses ? " 
 
 He had in his stable at that moment four of 
 the fleetest and best that had ever been foaled, 
 swift as the wind, strong as the storm, un-
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 65 
 
 tamable in spirit. He would show them to 
 the illustrious Excellencies, and dumbfound 
 them with admiration. 
 
 A carriage did their Highnesses want? 
 A palace on wheels ? They could have it. 
 He had the most sumptuous thing of the 
 kind to be found in the Near East. A driver 
 with a sure hand and a perfect knowledge of 
 the roads. Who, he asked, could drive better 
 than he himself? Who knew the roads as he 
 knew them ? Had he not travelled them night 
 and day, summer and winter, since childhood ? 
 And his son Isaac, was he not peerless amongst 
 postillions ? And all this is at the command 
 of the most illustrious Excellencies for 
 
 " We will see the horses first and talk about 
 a price later," was the curt answer. " Lead 
 the way to the stable, Jew." 
 
 At the stable - door the Hebrew cried 
 warningly : " Have a care, your Excellencies, 
 have a care. The little one, the grey one, the 
 fierce one, is nearest the door. ' Heart of Fire,' 
 the neighbours call him. He is a tornado in 
 the hide of a horse." 
 
 He lifted the light high, and the officers saw 
 "Heart of Fire" half-standing, half -leaning 
 against the shaky wall that divided the stall 
 from another. It was as mean a beast to look 
 at as ever horse-dealer wasted praise upon. 
 
 As the Hebrew went near the animal with 
 
 E
 
 66 MAROZIA 
 
 exaggerated signs of mingled fear and affec- 
 tion, the scarecrow screwed its head round 
 from the manger, with a wisp of hay 
 dangling from its immense yellow teeth, 
 which told that its age was a matter for 
 mental arithmetic. Its ribs were nearly 
 through its mangy hide, and there was a gash 
 hi its near foreknee that testified dumbly 
 to the creature's capacity to fall down at a 
 moment's notice. 
 
 The Jew went towards the nightmare on 
 tiptoe, with his right hand outstretched 
 murmuring soothing things as if in terror of 
 his life. " Steady, my wild one ! Gently, 
 gently, my wayward one ! Sh-ss, sh-ss, my 
 pride, my hope ! " " Heart of Fire " laid 
 one ear back, and absolutely yawned, looking 
 at that moment as spiritless an equine as 
 ever courted the knacker's knife. 
 
 One of the officers, growing tired of the 
 farce, stepped forward and savagely prodded 
 " Heart of Fire " in the flank with his scabbard. 
 Instead of lashing out with both heels and 
 kicking half the tumble - down stable into 
 ruins, " Heart of Fire " flicked his scraggy 
 tail tamely and let his head droop dejectedly, 
 and prepared to go to sleep. 
 
 With a furious oath the officer raised the 
 scabbard and struck the Jew several sounding 
 blows across the shoulders, crying : " Dog of
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 67 
 
 a Jew ! Is this the wild hurricane of a horse 
 you would provide us with ? Is this the 
 creature that is fleeter than the wind, and 
 wild as the storm ? Show us the others, or 
 we will take the skin from your body." 
 
 The Hebrew protested and cringed beneath 
 the hail of blows, and at last declared that 
 some wealthy merchants had hired his good 
 team ; and as they had paid a deposit he could 
 not break faith with them. The visitors 
 vowed that they would serve the merchants 
 as they had served him if they came upon 
 the scene, and bade the Jew bring forth his 
 best without delay. As he was in fear of 
 further violence, he did as he was bidden, and 
 in a very short time the carriage rolled out 
 of the yard, with the Jew on the box and 
 the bullies inside. 
 
 Half an hour later two merchants arrived 
 and demanded a carriage and team from the 
 Jew's wife. She, poor woman, could do 
 nothing but tell them what had happened. 
 They cut short her lamentations, the spokes- 
 man saying : " Come quickly, woman ; tell us 
 two things firstly, where did the officers 
 bid your husband drive them ? secondly, will 
 ' Heart of Fire ' carry a man and a saddle, 
 and have you another horse that will do the 
 same ? " 
 
 Something in the speaker's tone and manner
 
 68 MAROZIA 
 
 told the Jewess, who had a marvellously quick 
 ear, that these so-called merchants were not 
 what they seemed. Therefore, she deemed it 
 expedient to be truthful. She gave them the 
 address they sought, and then said : " The 
 horses in the stalls are good enough to carry 
 you to the next villayet if you spur them well ; 
 and good horses can be obtained there." 
 
 " That means that your horses will carry us 
 three leagues and no more ? Well, we cannot 
 choose, so we take what lies to our hand." 
 
 They saddled the sorry animals and rode 
 off, and " Heart of Fire," true to his general 
 appearance, did his best to break his own neck 
 and his rider's half a dozen times during the 
 journey. At the next villayet the merchants 
 were more fortunate. 
 
 They obtained a couple of good horses, and 
 rode swiftly and silently. Evidently they 
 knew what they had to do, and did not need 
 to discuss matters. In three hours they caught 
 the Jew's carriage, and one riding upon each 
 side they commanded the driver to halt. Then, 
 thrusting a pistol into each window, they bade 
 the inmates step out, one at a time. 
 
 This order was obeyed with alacrity, though 
 the men in the carriage blustered with their 
 hands on their sword hilts. 
 
 " Come, come, to-night we do the talking, 
 Capitan Pero," remarked one of the merchants
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 69 
 
 with an ill-concealed sneer, " so hold your 
 peace." 
 
 " What do you require of us ? " was the 
 sulky rejoinder. 
 
 " We want the letter you are carrying for 
 Marozia the Queen." 
 
 " You shall have my life first." 
 
 "As you please," was the incisive answer, 
 and a pistol was pointed straight at the 
 Captain's head. 
 
 " I would as soon take it from you dead as 
 living ; but I shall take it." 
 
 The fierce Captain promptly thrust his left 
 hand into his tunic and, drawing forth a letter, 
 handed it with many curses to the horsemen, 
 who immediately tore it open and examined it. 
 
 " This is all we need ! " he exclaimed to his 
 comrade. " We have the Queen in a cleft 
 stick now. Gentlemen, you can drive on." 
 
 When the carriage had moved away the 
 second man said to the one who held the 
 letter : " Marozia has played us false, then ? " 
 
 " She has given all our plans away to her 
 Austrian lover," was the answer. " This letter 
 proves it to the hilt. She means to bring 
 about war between Bulgaria and Turkey. 
 Out of the ruins she hopes to pick something 
 to her own advantage." 
 
 "War with Bulgaria will not suit us just 
 at present," answered his comrade, "for the
 
 70 MAROZIA 
 
 Russian will take sides with Bulgaria, and 
 Turkey has no money." 
 
 " We must remove this woman." His com- 
 panion touched his knife-belt hilt significantly. 
 " That way or another, but however it is done 
 it must be done to-night. Her presence in 
 Philippopolis to-morrow may mean war. She 
 is the cleverest woman in the world, and the 
 most dangerous. Her one weakness is a 
 handsome man. I knew that was so, that 
 was why I had this splendidly handsome 
 Austrian watched so closely. She is to be 
 at the masked ball to-night. She is there 
 now dressed as Leeta, the snake charmer; I 
 have that from a sure hand. Come along, 
 this must be Marozia's last dance." 
 
 They touched their horses with the spurs, 
 and broke into a canter. But one other man 
 was riding in the same direction, a grand 
 looking man, superbly mounted. It was 
 Marozia's handsome Austrian lover, to whom 
 the two officers had told the tale of the 
 highway robbery. He was a diplomat, and 
 besides, he was madly smitten by the wayward 
 Queen's charms. Arriving in Philippopolis 
 he searched for and quickly found Leeta, 
 the beautiful snake charmer, whose personal 
 resemblance to Marozia was wonderful. He 
 knew her well, and it did not take him long 
 to persuade her to don a mask and accompany
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 71 
 
 him to the ball. Marozia the Queen saw her 
 own double dancing with a masked man, whose 
 identity she was not slow to guess, and her 
 acute brain told her that her plans had mis- 
 carried, else this man would not be dancing 
 in Philippopolis. 
 
 In the dance she brushed close to him and 
 whispered quickly, " Why are you here ? " 
 
 " Fly for your life ! " he whispered ; " Turkey 
 knows all." 
 
 Marozia was a bold woman, but she paled at 
 those words. 
 
 " And you ? " she whispered. 
 
 " I will meet you in Vienna," he answered. 
 " For God's sake fly." 
 
 " I will await you there," she cried. " Do 
 not keep me waiting long." 
 
 The Turkish agents who were watching the 
 dancers were nonplussed to see a pair of 
 snake charmers almost exactly alike in dress, 
 height, and carriage. 
 
 " Which is the Queen ? " asked one to the 
 other. 
 
 Then his eyes fell upon the Austrian, and he 
 laughed. "That is the Queen," said he. 
 " The one with the tall man in the red mask 
 watch her." And that was how Marozia the 
 Queen was enabled to slip away unmolested, 
 and a few hours put her out of the reach of 
 the Turkish arms.
 
 72 MAROZIA 
 
 The men were watching her double, who 
 danced almost continually with the Austrian. 
 She chattered lightly to him and laughed, for 
 she loved the dance. But he, the fine, 
 handsome fellow was thinking of his last 
 words to Marozia, " I will meet you in 
 Vienna," and of the dazzling smile she had 
 given him in return. 
 
 Sitting out a dance in a shaded alcove, 
 some two hours after Marozia's departure, the 
 joyous Leeta whispered that she would like 
 some sherbet, for the room was ill- ventilated 
 and hot. 
 
 The Austrian smiled, and beckoning an 
 attendant ordered two glasses of sherbet with 
 ice in it. 
 
 A man standing close by followed the 
 attendant, and in menacing tones whispered 
 an order in his ear, at the same time 
 slipping a powder into his hand. It was the 
 same man who had opened the letter of 
 Marozia the Queen upon the highway. 
 
 The attendant shivered and obeyed the 
 whispered command. Before he took the 
 drink to the two merrymakers in the alcove 
 he had placed half of the powder in each 
 glass. Shortly afterwards, two other lovers 
 seeking the same alcove came across two 
 bodies very still and very rigid, and they 
 stopped the dance with wild cries of terror.
 
 LEETA, THE SNAKE CHARMER 73 
 
 " Ah ! " said one of the Turkish emissaries 
 to the other, "they have found the dead 
 body of Marozia and her Austrian lover ; let 
 us be moving. Our work is done. Marozia 
 has danced her last dance." 
 
 But at that moment the wayward Queen 
 was many a league away speeding to safety. 
 Once again a man had stood between her 
 and the penalty of her misdeeds, and had 
 given a life for her. But the end was not 
 far off for her, though she did not know it 
 as she chuckled over her scheming.
 
 VI 
 A STRONG MAN'S WOOING
 
 VI 
 
 RELO village was lying quiet and quaint in 
 the moonlight, an old-world, out-of-the-way 
 place on the Bulgarian side of the Macedonian 
 border. 
 
 It might have gone to sleep after the 
 Roman legions tramped through, and only 
 just have awakened. Everything in it was 
 out of date in appearance. Nothing spoke 
 of the passing of the ages. 
 
 The little wine cafes, open full front to the 
 streets, where the peasants sat drinking their 
 white wine in their sheepskin coats and caps, 
 their knee-breeches, and shoes turned up at 
 the point, with untanned leather straps cross- 
 ing and recrossing each other from ankle to 
 knee, were just as they had been when the 
 barbarians overran Europe. The little black- 
 smith's shops, where the gipsies worked at 
 everything, from the mending of an old iron 
 pot, to the making of horseshoes, and the 
 welding of swords and daggers, were as 
 crude as in the days of the Crusaders. 
 
 77
 
 78 MAROZIA 
 
 Dwelling-houses and shops lined both sides 
 of the rough causeway, that lay at the feet 
 of the mountains on which Turkish sentinel- 
 fires burnt eternally through the long summer 
 nights. Queer little houses, with balconies 
 that hung far over the narrow paths below, 
 marked the homes of the more important 
 of the village folk. Men and women leant 
 against these balcony - rails and smoked 
 cigarettes made of home-grown tobacco, and 
 at times chatted with neighbours across the 
 way, or else they sang the wild border songs 
 full of love and battle songs that made a 
 stranger fancy he could hear the clash of 
 steel, the tread of tramping feet, the hoof- 
 strokes of galloping squadrons, and the laugh- 
 ing and the sighing of women. 
 
 Lights flickered in nearly every window, 
 but there were no lamps in the street, and 
 every now and again some village Don Juan, 
 muffled so as to escape detection, might have 
 been seen lurking in the shadows, or stealing 
 along the street as near the sheltering walls 
 as his feet could take him. Very careful in 
 their love-making were those men, for there 
 were no divorce laws in Relo only the 
 divorce that comes when the knife is driven 
 hard home to the hilt, or the crack of a pistol 
 proves virtue's advocate against illicit love. 
 
 A merry, hard-working, honest set of folk
 
 A STRONG HANTS WOOING 79 
 
 were these mountain men ; but their blood 
 was hot as lava, and their passions apt to 
 flame up like forest fires, and when that 
 happened it was good to be out of the way, 
 for blood is apt to be spilt on such occasions. 
 Now and then a brown-cowled monk from the 
 neighbouring monastery flitted by, making 
 but little noise as he passed upon his errand 
 of mercy. Very often the cowl and cloak 
 hid the well-armed figure of some leader of 
 the Macedonian insurgent bands, bent upon 
 a warlike mission for Relo was a famous 
 haunt of the wild mountain-men, who were 
 always ready to volunteer to do battle with 
 the Turks when the ruthless soldiery of the 
 Sultan lit the valleys with burning home- 
 steads, which was not at all a rare occurrence. 
 But on this night there were other folk 
 afoot in the streets of Relo to attract the 
 attention of the villagers. A little party of 
 well-dressed people, who were evidently bent 
 solely upon pleasure. One of these merry- 
 makers was a woman in the full flush of her 
 young matronhood ; a ripe, rich beauty of 
 face, and a wonderfully handsome figure was 
 her birthright, and she seemed to be exercising 
 her charms to the full extent of her powers 
 upon a stalwart man who walked beside her. 
 That her cavalier was a soldier any one could 
 have told at a glance by his carriage, even
 
 80 MAROZIA 
 
 though he was dressed in mufti. That he 
 was bewitched by his fair companion any 
 person who could hear the tones of his voice, 
 and see the play of his features, would have 
 discovered instantly. 
 
 As the revellers passed under the balcony 
 that overhung the lower storey of the house 
 of Hia Nikoloff, the tobacco -grower, three 
 or four men, who had been idling up there 
 smoking cigarettes most of the evening, leant 
 over the rail and watched the group in the 
 street. 
 
 " There can be no doubt it is Marozia the 
 Queen," said one. Then he added, with an 
 oath : " She may be Queen, but it is not 
 queenly to do as she is doing to-night." 
 
 " It would be bad enough if the man at 
 her side was her husband, instead of her 
 lover," answered one of the others. " It is 
 lowering to the dignity of our people to see 
 her flitting about on foot in the moonlight 
 like any peasant woman." 
 
 " Who is the man ? " demanded one who 
 had not hitherto spoken. " I thought her 
 latest lover was the black - moustached 
 Russian ; but this is no Muscovite." 
 
 " Her latest lover ! " sneered the man who 
 had first spoken. " How long does a lover 
 last with Marozia the Queen ? She is as fickle 
 as she is beautiful."
 
 A STRONG MAN'S WOOING 81 
 
 " Is this the Austrian who was dangling 
 about her in Paris last winter, I wonder?" 
 put in another. 
 
 "You are wrong in that guess," whispered 
 one. " I knew the Austrian by sight, and 
 he is not built like this man. This is a new 
 toy." 
 
 " A new toy yes ! " sneered one. " And 
 she will throw him away as soon as her fancy 
 changes." 
 
 "These doings will lead to trouble yet, 
 unless Her Majesty puts a bridle upon her 
 pleasures." 
 
 " She will never do that, my friend. She is 
 reckless and fearless." 
 
 " She may find others as reckless as herself," 
 was the dark answer. "It is bad enough for 
 her to play the light o' love in our own 
 country, but it is past all bearing that she 
 should come here and make us a by-word 
 for these Bulgars and Macedonians." 
 
 " How can we alter it ? She is Queen, and 
 queens can do no wrong," was the sneering 
 retort. 
 
 As these words left the speaker's lips a 
 merry peal of laughter came rippling upwards 
 from the street below. It was Marozia the 
 Queen enjoying some jest uttered by the 
 tall cavalier at her side. 
 
 The watchers on the balcony swore fiercely
 
 82 MAROZIA 
 
 in low tones, for they belonged to the con- 
 spirators' party, and some of them were later 
 destined to play a part in one of the most 
 brutal butcheries known to modern times. 
 
 They hated the gloriously lovely Queen, 
 because in all her amours she favoured none 
 of them, and openly displayed her contempt 
 for them. A day was coming when she 
 would pay for that contempt with her life. 
 She was to learn that little souls can seethe 
 with black and bitter hate ; and that white, 
 full bosom of hers, that to-night is rising 
 and falling as she laughs joyously, was to be 
 gashed with many a knife and dagger-thrust, 
 but not in the Perrin Mountains, not in the 
 Bulgar village, though the conspirators were 
 there for the purpose of doing her to death 
 if they could only find fitting opportunity 
 and pretext. 
 
 Marozia the Queen and her escort passed on. 
 At the far end of the village, where the road 
 winds upwards towards the monastery, she 
 and the tall man parted from the rest of the 
 company; for this royal coquette could be 
 as imprudent as any peasant lass who worked 
 in the rose-gardens when the mood was upon 
 her, and it was upon her this night. 
 
 Side by side the lovers walked up that 
 winding road, where the scented pine-trees 
 cast deep shadows. The man was holding
 
 A STRONG MAN'S WOOING 83 
 
 the woman's hand and pleading in passionate 
 tones, telling the old, old tale that has been 
 told so often in the moonlight when folly 
 and beauty have met. 
 
 Wondrously beautiful looked Marozia the 
 Queen. Her big eyes were full of the 
 witchery that all women of her sort, since 
 Cleopatra's day, have owned. Her red lips 
 were full and moist; her hair fluttered in 
 the night wind. The snowy whiteness of her 
 full, round throat showed plainly when the soft 
 black wrapper fell down upon her shoulders ; 
 and the man, looking at her with burning 
 eyes, cared nothing that she was a Queen. 
 To him she was a woman, a glorious, glowing 
 creature of flesh and blood. 
 
 He paused and faced her, and for a moment 
 the two looked into each other's eyes. Then, 
 without a word the man took her in his strong 
 arms and kissed the moisture from her lips, 
 kissed her half fiercely ; and she, who had 
 made men tremble and plead with her for her 
 favours, found this bold wooing stir her wild 
 blood. He drew her head to his shoulders and 
 turned her face up so that the moonlight fell 
 upon it. Then, as he gazed on her beauty, he 
 went mad once more, and kissed her upon the 
 lips, the eyes, the cheeks kissed her as if he 
 could have eaten her red-and-white loveliness, 
 and as he held her a man, running strongly,
 
 84 MAROZIA 
 
 dashed around the curve in the mountain pass 
 just behind them a man running with a 
 purpose, from the village of Relo. 
 
 The wooer swung the woman behind him 
 and faced the newcomer, standing so that 
 his body shielded her from danger. A bad 
 man he might be, but he was a brave one. 
 
 The messenger paused, panting heavily, 
 proving that he had been running at the 
 top of his speed. "Excellency," he cried, 
 speaking English with a strong Bulgarian 
 accent, " Excellency, the enemies of the 
 Queen are following you. They will be here 
 in a minute." 
 
 The lover spoke in the same tongue, only 
 he, spoke it as a native. "Velo," he said, 
 "the Queen is not here." 
 
 The man Velo gazed with all his eyes. 
 "Not here, Excellency?" 
 
 " No ; this is one of the Queen's ladies, 
 Velo. Marozia the Queen is safe in her own 
 apartments." 
 
 Velo gaped for a moment, then the mean- 
 ing of it all came to him. " That is so, 
 Excellency. I was a blind bat not to see 
 as much for myself. But, Excellency, the 
 Queen's enemies will be here in a few seconds, 
 and they are many. They will show no mercy 
 to you, or to the Que , to the lady." 
 
 " Can we reach the monastery before them ? "
 
 A STRONG MAN'S WOOING 85 
 
 " No, Excellency ; the lady cannot climb 
 fast enough." 
 
 " Is there any other pass, Velo ? " 
 
 "None, Excellency." 
 
 " Velo 1 " 
 
 " Yes, Excellency." 
 
 " We have fought against the Turks side 
 by side, you and I." 
 
 " That is so, Excellency." 
 
 " Then take this lady to the monastery, 
 remain on guard all night, and in the morning 
 see her to safety with some of your mountain- 
 men. I will stay and hold this path." 
 
 Velo showed his white teeth in a grin of 
 pleasure as he quickly unlinked his yataghan, 
 and passed it to the man who had called 
 him comrade. 
 
 Marozia the Queen put her hand upon the 
 muscular arm of the man who a minute before 
 had kissed her. " They will surely kill you ! " 
 she said. 
 
 He smiled back in her face. " What does 
 it matter ? " he said. " I have lived a lifetime 
 to-night ; I have drained pleasure to the dregs. 
 Now, go with Velo to safety, for I hear 
 the sound of coming feet." 
 
 Marozia the Queen lifted her winsome face, 
 caring nothing that Velo, the mountaineer, 
 was standing by, and she kissed the adventurer 
 on the mouth.
 
 86 MAROZIA 
 
 " Come," said Velo, " the wolves are upon 
 us." 
 
 He took the Queen by the hand, and 
 together they ran in and out amongst the 
 moonlight and the shadows. 
 
 The man left alone in the pass tossed off 
 his coat, and, baring his right arm to the 
 elbow, stood with his yataghan, waiting. He 
 had not long to wait. The pursuers came 
 on at the double, three abreast. They did 
 not hesitate when they saw the grim, motion- 
 less figure, but, steel in hand, charged on. 
 
 He sprang to meet them. With a mighty 
 sweep of his blade a cavalryman's stroke 
 he checked the rush ; and then, thrusting, 
 parrying, attacking, retreating, he fought to 
 save the life and fair fame of the royal coquette. 
 He fought until the sweat dripped from his 
 brow and trickled down his neck fought 
 silently, as men do who know there is no 
 hope, yet have no fear. 
 
 One man, rasher than the others, or bolder, 
 met his point full, and went down, first upon 
 one knee, then upon his hands and knees, 
 finally he slid forward and lay very still. But 
 there were others behind to take his place. 
 
 The adventurer fought on. Blood was 
 mingling with the sweat that dripped from 
 him ; his arm could barely lift the steel. He 
 gathered himself together for one last effort,
 
 A STRONG MAN'S WOOING 8? 
 
 and, careless of his life, sprang right amongst 
 them, hewing with all the might that was 
 in him at the circling foes. Steel flickered 
 on all sides in the moonlight, like tongues of 
 flame in a burning barn. Then the man went 
 down. The avengers gazed at him where he 
 lay ; then they wiped their blades upon their 
 cloaks, and, picking up their own men, went 
 away, leaving the adventurer lying where he 
 had fallen. 
 
 Next day the newspapers told the world 
 that there had been another outrage in the 
 Perrin Mountains by Macedonian brigands ; 
 but Marozia the Queen could have told a 
 different story.
 
 VII 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL
 
 VII 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 
 
 "So that is Marozia the Queen, is it, comrade ? 
 Pouff! I've seen many fairer women on the 
 mountain side. May I eat black bread with- 
 out soup all my days if I can see what there is 
 in her to drive men mad with love. There 
 are a dozen wenches in this market-place of 
 Sofia to-day as handsome as she is." 
 
 " She has beautiful eyes ; you cannot deny 
 that, friend. And a well-formed figure also, 
 what is the use of faulting; she is Marozia, 
 and men who know her go drunken with 
 her witchery." 
 
 "Anything with a petticoat upon it will 
 drive some men drunken, just as the scent of 
 blood upon the air will drive some oxen crazy. 
 I heard a priest say this morning that she 
 is the devil in disguise. Well, if that be so, 
 half the young bloods in Bulgaria are going 
 to the devil." 
 
 " Some of you gossips will get your tongues 
 slit," growled a man who was standing near 
 
 91
 
 92 MAROZIA 
 
 the talkative group ; " why can you not attend 
 to your own affairs, and let Marozia the Queen 
 mend or break her own business ? She would 
 not wipe her shoes on the beard of the best 
 man amongst you all, and you know it." 
 
 The knot of peasants turned wrathfully upon 
 the speaker, more than one of them laying 
 hand to knife-hilt ominously, as they answered 
 his jibe with fiery retorts. But he made light 
 of their wrath. He was a thick-set fellow 
 in the prime of life, and as he stood in the 
 market-place balancing himself firmly on his 
 strong legs, he looked like a man quite 
 capable of holding his own in any melee that 
 might arise. They were a bold independent 
 lot of fellows, mostly from the hills near 
 Sofia, who had come to the market to dis- 
 pose of the produce of their tiny farms, 
 orchards, and vineyards, and it ruffled their 
 fiery tempers to be told that they must put 
 a bridle on their tongues. 
 
 " Varco has become a miracle of politeness 
 since he married," jeered one, pointing a big 
 forefinger at the man who had broken in 
 upon their chatter. 
 
 " Marriage seems to have changed him," 
 sneered another. " Time was when his words 
 were not always picked out with care like 
 apples one is going to take to the market." 
 
 " Ah ! but then Varco was a free lance
 
 LOVE IN A NUT SHELL 93 
 
 on the borders, taking his toll of Turk and 
 Christian alike. Now he is a family man, 
 and has a good farm of his own, and such 
 responsibilities cool the warmest blood," cried 
 another, throwing a world of mock pity into 
 his voice. "Time was," he added, "when 
 Varco could cry * Halt ! stand and deliver,' 
 as gruffly as any man between Sofia and 
 Constantinople. " 
 
 The man addressed as Varco grinned good- 
 humouredly into the angry faces. " The past 
 is dead," said he ; " let the grass grow over 
 it. If I ever robbed any, I never robbed the 
 poor, and I never took toll from an unarmed 
 man ; as for being tamed, well that is as it 
 may be, but I hate to hear grown men talking 
 of a woman and such a woman." 
 
 " Has she bitten you, Varco, you of all 
 men ? " cried one of the group. " What magic 
 is in the woman, that she can draw even so 
 bold a fellow to her side with a glance ? " 
 
 " Magic ; the only magic I know of is her 
 courage," retorted Varco ; " she has more of 
 that in her little finger than any man I ever 
 knew could carry in his whole body. If she 
 were a man she would weld all these petty 
 states together, as Beltoo, the smith, there, 
 welds hot iron ; she would build up a nation 
 in the Balkans that would crush Austria, as 
 a steer's hoof crushes a ripe apple."
 
 94 MAROZIA 
 
 " If she has the wit as well as the courage, 
 Varco, what does it matter if she be man 
 or woman ? Women have made history before 
 to-day," snapped Beltoo, the smith. 
 
 Varco laughed quietly. " All women who 
 rule come to grief sooner or later," he 
 chuckled ; " history teaches us that." 
 
 " I do not see why they should," stormed 
 one of his hearers. 
 
 " That is because you know so little of 
 women," was the retort ; " a woman even in 
 the most dangerous moments will turn aside 
 from her ambitions to glut her eyes with love, 
 and love blinds even the wisest." 
 
 " Who are those men with her now, Varco ? " 
 
 Varco shrugged his broad shoulders. " Who 
 they are I do not know ; but what they 
 are, any man who has not lived a lifetime 
 in one spot can tell at a glance. They are 
 adventurers from several countries ; soldiers 
 who have made their own nests too warm for 
 them such flock to Marozia's court in the 
 hope of lifting themselves out of the mire 
 once more." 
 
 " They came to her to use her, Varco." 
 
 "They do not often gain much for their 
 pains then ; ravens do not grow fat on what 
 they plunder from an eagle's eyrie." 
 
 Whilst the folk were discussing her in 
 this free and easy fashion, Marozia stood and
 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 95 
 
 watched the life of the market-place, her 
 foreign friends around her. One of these was 
 a man in the noon of life, a thick-set man 
 with an almost gigantic pair of shoulders. 
 So broad across the chest was he, that his 
 width made him appear very short of stature ; 
 it was only when he stood near other men 
 that a beholder could have seen that he was 
 quite of the average height of humanity. He 
 had very small feet, large hands, a waist that 
 was very nearly womanish. A neck like a 
 pillar of granite, and a good-looking face that 
 was pleasing to the eye of men or maids. He 
 was very fair, this unknown man, grey-eyed, 
 with a yellow moustache that drooped right 
 down below his square chin. He had the 
 confident, almost careless carriage of a man 
 absolutely sure of himself in every way. This 
 was Oscar Monthee, a son of old Norway. 
 Though dressed in mufti he carried the stamp 
 of the tried campaigner in his every movement. 
 A very understandable matter considering that 
 he had fought hah over the world at one time 
 or another. In Cuba he had fought for 
 America against the Spaniards. In China he 
 had led a brigade against the Japanese, and 
 he had carried a sword for Russia against 
 the Turks. As reckless a free lance as ever 
 buckled on blade, and as good and loyal a 
 comrade as man ever had.
 
 96 MAROZIA 
 
 Fate had drifted him to the East, and there 
 he had met Marozia, and the wilful beauty 
 had caressed him with her eyes, much to the 
 annoyance of those other adventurers who 
 hoped to bask in her smiles. 
 
 They gave him curt welcome at the Court, 
 and black looks, and it was as much their 
 frowns as Marozia's smiles that induced him to 
 stay, for Oscar Monthee was the last man 
 living to move on, because of other men's 
 scowling brows. 
 
 He had that in his blood which made peril 
 as sweet to him as honey in the comb is to 
 the ant. When Marozia determined to leave 
 the kingdom for a little time for the purpose 
 of visiting Bulgaria she had broken up her 
 court. That was one of her modes of getting 
 rid of people of whom she had grown tired, 
 one or two of the more ardent of her admirers 
 had managed to find some excuse for visiting 
 Sofia during her stay in that city, and Oscar 
 Monthee was of the number. 
 
 He had, or he fancied he had, good reasons 
 for believing that he would be welcome. 
 Marozia was full of wild spirits this day. It 
 was part of her policy to go thus amongst 
 the market folk just as if she was one of the 
 people. Other rulers held themselves aloof 
 from the populace, Marozia, when the mood 
 was upon her, would go from one stall to
 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 97 
 
 the other and chat for a while with old or young, 
 enquiring into the state of the country, asking 
 after the health and welfare of families, for 
 it was part of her policy to win the common 
 people over to her if she could do so with- 
 out exciting suspicion. Sometimes she made 
 small purchases, but not often ; once she 
 stopped in front of a stall over which a tall, 
 gaunt, old peasant woman presided. "Ah, 
 Katherine," she said, " so you are still in the 
 market-place, busy as of old." 
 
 The woman answered pleasantly enough that 
 she was always at her post, seeing that was 
 the only way in which she could make a liveli- 
 hood. 
 
 Marozia picked up a small basket of almonds 
 from the stall, and selecting a few, handed them 
 with light laughter to the gentlemen by whom 
 she was surrounded. 
 
 They took the Queen's gift, entering into 
 the spirit of the thing like so many school-boys 
 out for a frolic. Only the old woman noticed 
 that when she gave a small handful of almonds 
 to Oscar Monthee her shapely hand seemed 
 to linger in his for a longer period than the 
 act warranted. 
 
 A moment or two later the party dispersed, 
 and Varco, the peasant farmer, happened to 
 find himself in a narrow street just beyond 
 the market-place. He looked up lazily as he
 
 98 MAROZIA 
 
 sauntered on, and beheld the sign of the " Red 
 Crab." He gave a sigh of content, and turned 
 in at the ever-open door, and seating himself 
 at a table called for a bottle of white wine. 
 
 As he sat waiting for the wine he rolled a 
 cigarette deftly in his fingers. Suddenly his 
 quick eyes fell upon the form of a man who 
 sat alone at a small table. The man was 
 cracking almonds with his teeth. " That's the 
 fellow I saw with Queen Marozia in the market- 
 place a few moments back," mused Varco. 
 
 And out of mere curiosity he watched the 
 other man closely. All at once he saw the 
 man he was watching draw a cracked almond 
 very carefully from under his big, yellow 
 moustache. Varco saw him part the broken 
 shells with deft fingers and draw out a tiny 
 piece of white paper closely folded. A smile 
 ran over Varco's dark face. "Ah," he 
 muttered, "so that was why Marozia the 
 Queen gave you the almonds, was it? a case 
 of love in a nut-shell." 
 
 Varco had quick wits ; when he had been 
 a mountain brigand, before he settled down 
 and became a family man and a farmer, his 
 wits had saved his neck more than once. 
 When the man had glanced at his love-letter 
 he looked up swiftly, but Varco was minutely 
 and critically surveying the newly - rolled 
 cigarette in his fingers, still he had time to
 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 99 
 
 notice all that followed out of the corners of 
 his eyes, a trick he had cultivated before he 
 became a farmer. 
 
 The man with the yellow moustache, who 
 was none other than Oscar Monthee, read 
 his note once more, smiling as he did so ; 
 then he wrote an answer, folded the paper 
 very deftly, and opening an almond with the 
 edge of his knife abstracted the kernel and 
 placed the note inside, then he gummed the 
 shells together, and, finishing his wine, walked 
 out jauntily. 
 
 Varco rose and followed at a discreet 
 distance until he saw his man stop in front 
 of a fruit-seller's stall in the market-place, 
 and pass the old woman an almond. 
 
 He was no mischief-maker, this good Varco ; 
 he had satisfied his curiosity, and was content 
 to keep his mouth very close; he did not 
 intend to trade upon his knowledge. Varco 
 was not that sort. 
 
 The next day and for many days, however, 
 he watched the comedy with amusement. 
 He soon knew that the old woman at the 
 fruit-stall was in Marozia's pay, and it tickled 
 Varco's sense of humour to note the change 
 and interchange of letters, each wrapped in 
 its own nut-shell. One morning as Varco was 
 passing the fruit- stall he saw that for some 
 reason or another the old peasant dame was
 
 100 MAROZIA 
 
 in terrible distress. He knew her very well, 
 as he knew everybody in those parts. 
 
 " What ails you, mother ? " he cried, in his 
 gruff way. 
 
 The dame looked hard at him. " I am in a 
 cleft stick, Varco," said she ; " time was when 
 I would sooner have told you of my troubles 
 than any man between the four borders." 
 
 " Well, mother, and why not tell me now ? 
 I am the same man that you once knew." 
 
 " I am not so sure of that, Varco, you do 
 not go amongst your old friends as you did 
 of old time." 
 
 " Pish, I do not go amongst them, mother, 
 because I do not follow the same trade 
 nowadays ; but for all that 1 would not fail 
 to help one of them in need." 
 
 " You were the boldest of them always, 
 Varco. I wish that I could trust you 
 now," whispered the dame, gazing at him 
 keenly from under her bonny brows. 
 
 " Well, mother, why don't you ? " 
 
 " Because I fear that you have forgotten 
 that you were once one of us." 
 
 "I shall never forget that," was the quiet 
 reply ; " nor shall I forget that it was your 
 husband that carried me on his shoulders 
 through the mountains when the snow was 
 knee deep and I had a bullet from a border 
 guardsman's rifle in my ribs."
 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 101 
 
 " You remember that, Varco ? " 
 
 " Yes, mother, and I remember also that 
 it was you who nursed me back to strength 
 again at a time when the border guards were 
 searching high and low for me, and a price, 
 a big price, was on my head if you want 
 
 me, whistle, I'm your dog " he turned as 
 
 if to walk away. 
 
 "Varco." 
 
 " Yes, mother." 
 
 "Varco, I am in the pay of Marozia the 
 Queen ; I have eaten her salt." 
 
 " So, mother, she needs salt with her nuts, 
 does she ? " 
 
 The old woman glared. " Are you a spy, 
 after all, Varco ? " 
 
 " I use my eyes, mother, but not for ill 
 tell me your trouble." 
 
 " Marozia has a lover, Varco." 
 
 " She has many, mother." 
 
 " I only know of one, and he has been 
 betrayed." 
 
 "The good-looking fellow with the broad 
 shoulders and the yellow moustache ? " 
 
 " That is the man, though, Mother of God, 
 how you know so much puzzles me. He 
 came every day and got an almond and left 
 an almond, Varco." 
 
 " Yes, mother, and each almond contained 
 a love-letter. I know that much."
 
 102 MAROZIA 
 
 " Other people know as much, though how 
 the secret leaked out is more than I can tell, 
 some one must watch Queen Marozia closely, 
 or else some one in her service is not faithful ; 
 and Varco, her husband, the King, knows 
 that she has been making love to * Golden 
 Moustache.'" 
 
 " How do you know that, mother ? " 
 
 " Because he was waylaid this morning and 
 nearly killed by some of the King's servants, 
 but he managed to send me an almond with 
 a note inside, saying : * Warn Marozia the 
 Queen ; she is in danger.' ' 
 
 " Have you warned her, mother ? " 
 
 " No, Varco." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Because I only received the message a 
 moment before I saw you, and Marozia is at 
 the old hunting-lodge in the mountains, ten 
 good leagues from here. It was there that 
 she had to meet this lover of hers. You 
 know the spot, Varco." 
 
 " I know it well, mother. Do you want 
 me to get to saddle and warn her?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Because she is a woman. I do not think 
 she loved this golden-moustached one over- 
 much, but there was danger in the fooling, 
 and the danger appealed to her ; as for him,
 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 108 
 
 why, he is like you used to be before you 
 married and became a caged bird, Varco. 
 Hedge a woman round with spears and he 
 would fret his soul to get to her ; but let her 
 run free and he would not give a golden 
 Napoleon for her." 
 
 Varco laughed. " If I go to her, mother, I 
 must have a talisman of some sort, or she 
 will never believe me." 
 
 The woman drew an almond from the 
 breast of her bodice. " Give her that," said 
 she, " his letter to me is inside it ; she will 
 know you for a true man by that token." 
 
 Varco stepped rapidly away, and taking 
 his horse from the inn rode off by a path 
 that only the brigands and the contrabandists 
 knew. He rode, as few would have dared 
 to ride on such a track, and the good animal 
 he bestrode must have fancied that Varco 
 had taken up his old trade again. Marozia 
 saw him come thundering down the side of 
 a mountain like an avalanche, and her quick 
 wit told her that this was no ordinary man, 
 or an ordinary message. He did not waste 
 words. 
 
 " The man you know of is wounded almost 
 to the death ; your foes will be here to confound 
 you in a very few minutes. Here is my 
 warrant for my speech, Queen Marozia." He 
 thrust the almond into her hand as he spoke.
 
 104 MAROZIA 
 
 She read the note, then lifting her glorious 
 eyes to his face, she said : " I know you for 
 a true man, Varco; take me to safety." 
 
 He stiffened his foot in the stirrup, and, 
 bending down, offered her his hand. Marozia 
 took it, and placing her foot on his gave a 
 little spring, and in a moment she was on 
 the horse in front of him. 
 
 As they rode along by a secret path, she 
 said : " I will get back to Sofia and confound 
 my enemies ; and later, when the fruit is ripe, 
 I will avenge my friend." 
 
 " Yes," he answered ; " you will do all that 
 for you are Marozia, and I can easily put you 
 unseen into Sofia whilst those who seek you 
 are in the mountains ; a closed carriage is 
 easily obtained where I am going." 
 
 " You are a bold man, and a ready, Varco," 
 the Queen whispered. " Tell me, is there 
 anything on earth that you are afraid of?" 
 
 " Yes, Queen Marozia," he chuckled ; " I 
 would fear to let my wife see me riding 
 through the pine forest with another woman 
 where you are now queen or peasant." 
 
 Marozia gave a little sigh and let her glossy 
 head fall back upon his shoulder, her red lips 
 upturned within an inch or two of his own. 
 " I would give my kingdom to be loved so 
 by a man worth calling a man," she whispered. 
 
 For a moment Varco bent his face over
 
 LOVE IN A NUT-SHELL 105 
 
 hers, and the good horse came to a standstill ; 
 and all the time Marozia held clenched in her 
 pretty hand the almond that the man had 
 sent her, who was even then lying at the 
 point of death with a slit between his ribs 
 that a sword blade had made ; and she smiled, 
 knowing that the love of most men can be 
 carried in a nut-shell.
 
 VIII 
 
 THAT sooner or later some of Marozia's many 
 enemies would overtake her, all men who had 
 watched her career knew. She had played 
 with men's hearts all her lifetime, using her 
 baleful beauty and her nameless charm of 
 manner to draw them to her ; and when they 
 had filled the whim of the hour, she had 
 thrown them aside carelessly, indifferent con- 
 cerning their love or hate. 
 
 Sometimes the motive that induced her to 
 dally with a man was prompted by passion, 
 for in those matters she was as a leaf that the 
 whirlwind strikes. At such periods nothing 
 could stay her. Once her wilful heart was 
 set upon a man, she knew no law beyond her 
 own impulse. She was volcanic in her hates 
 as in her loves. 
 
 If a man pleased her fancy, for the time 
 being the whole world revolved around that 
 man. He was her sun by day, her star by 
 
 109
 
 110 MAROZIA 
 
 night, for she was swayed by her passions as 
 a bough is swayed by the wind. And this 
 weakness of hers made her whole life a net- 
 work of inconsistencies. 
 
 But there were times when she played at 
 being in love only for political purposes. 
 When this was the case she seldom failed 
 to achieve her ends, for she was a great 
 actress, and could stimulate love's fears so 
 nicely that even her women, lynx-eyed though 
 they were, could seldom tell at the time 
 whether Marozia was in earnest or not. It 
 was only when she had used her dupes that 
 she allowed her real feelings to be known. 
 
 Naturally some of her victims hated her 
 with a bitter hate, for no man likes it to be 
 known that a woman has wound him round 
 her finger like a piece of silk. It was an 
 article of faith with Marozia that all men, 
 young, middle-aged, or old, are vain, and she 
 played upon their vanity unceasingly. She 
 could be imperious, seductive, gentle, haughty, 
 timorous, daring, according to her scheming. 
 She could coo like any wood-pigeon in the 
 season of mating, and she could storm like 
 a devil unchained. Had she gone upon the 
 stage instead of playing for a throne, she 
 would have made as great a name as Bern- 
 hardt made. 
 
 But the real drama appealed more strongly
 
 THE DEATH OF MAROZIA 111 
 
 to her virile temperament. She played for 
 a throne she won it; but the throne was 
 not big enough for her. Had she been a 
 man, she would have tried to unite all the 
 paltry states in the Near East into one great 
 nation, and if she had succeeded she would 
 have aimed at the throne of the consolidated 
 empire, for there was no limit to her ambitions. 
 Before she met and conquered Mabon the 
 King her name had been coupled with that 
 of many men, two of whom were soldiers 
 vain, weak men both. She had used them 
 and their love, guilty as it was, as stepping- 
 stones to power, and when their usefulness 
 was past she turned her glorious face away 
 from them and wiped them out of the pages 
 of her memory as if they had never existed. 
 
 But if she forgot, they did not. Neither of 
 those men would have cut any figure in the 
 world. The greatest claims to fame or 
 notoriety either of them had was that in 
 her hours of dalliance, a woman who was to 
 fill a throne had once singled them out that 
 they might revel in the glory of her charms, 
 just as Cleopatra in her wayward moods might 
 have dallied with some common man. They 
 both considered themselves injured ; both 
 wore their wounds openly, that they might 
 be pointed at in cafe's as men on whose 
 shoulders a Queen had laid her glossy head.
 
 MAROZIA 
 
 As the years rolled by, and she rose higher 
 and higher, their grievance grew greater and 
 greater in their minds. They forgot that 
 had she been true to either of them, she 
 would have been a nameless nobody, for 
 they were both powerless coxcombs without 
 position, influence, or wealth. They were 
 officers, drawing the wretched pay that Seconia 
 gives her soldiers, and they had neither wit, 
 courage, nor audacity to lift themselves out 
 of the ruck. 
 
 Had Marozia failed in her scheming they 
 would have been amongst the first to throw 
 a jibe at her, as an old-time mistress whom 
 they had discarded when carelessness took 
 the place of passion ; but when she rose and 
 did not let them cling to her skirts to drag 
 her down or lift themselves, then they nursed 
 aggrievance, and looked upon themselves as 
 men blighted by a woman's inconsistency. 
 
 At various times and seasons they sought 
 to get the ear of Mabon the King, that 
 they might poison his mind against the 
 Queen. But all their scheming was vain. 
 Mabon might listen and swear vengeance, 
 he might go to Marozia with his heart full of 
 rage and his blood hot with wrath, but, once 
 in her presence, he became as clay in the 
 hands of the potter. She could mould him 
 to her will with a word, a look, a caress.
 
 THE DEATH OF MAROZIA 115 
 
 She would take his face between her soft 
 white hands, and looking into his eyes, steal 
 all his senses away. She would put her lips 
 to his those wonderful lips, so full and moist, 
 like the petals of the pink peach flower with 
 the honey in its heart, and he would forget 
 all that her enemies had said concerning her. 
 
 She knew his weakness knew how to play 
 with him and make him a servant and a slave. 
 He was born brave enough in a way, but 
 he was weak. One clasp of her big, white, 
 rounded arms would make him forget that 
 he was a King, with kingly duties. Before 
 he had wedded her all the influence of royal 
 families in nearly every Court in Europe had 
 been arrayed against her. Diplomats had 
 schemed in vain to weaken her hold upon 
 him. She had fought all the powers that 
 arrayed themselves in opposition to her. 
 Some she had cajoled, some she had flouted. 
 One by one she drove them from the field 
 until she laid the royal head upon her heart 
 and called the King her husband. 
 
 Those men who had called her a wanton 
 had a bad time within the Seconian border. 
 Many appealed to Mabon, and he promised 
 to stay his Consort's hand, but he bent to her 
 will as a willow bends to the hand of the 
 weavers of baskets, when she exercised over 
 him that witchery for which there is no 
 
 H
 
 114 MAROZIA 
 
 name. It was to lead him to his death in 
 the end, and this much must be said for 
 him, even by his enemies, that when the 
 end came, and he had to choose between a 
 coward's flight and the desertion of the 
 beautiful creature who had been his evil 
 genius, to the tender mercies of her foes or 
 death, he preferred death, and so stood and 
 took the steel like a man the one kingly 
 act of his whole career. At one time the 
 King had amongst his guards men who, whilst 
 they drew his pay would have died for him or 
 for his Queen, but by slow degrees all who 
 were not Seconians were weeded out from the 
 guards by those who were intriguing for 
 Marozia's downfall. 
 
 For a long time she had combated this 
 movement of her foes, but with the passing 
 of time she grew contemptuous of their 
 threats. She had been threatened so often 
 by men who were really dangerous, and had 
 escaped, that she grew to despise the fellows 
 who strutted around her in her own Court, 
 and most of all she despised the two who 
 at one time had won favours from her. 
 They each in turn tried to win their way 
 back into her heart, content to play lap-dog 
 to a queen ; but she disdained them, for well 
 she knew how they had talked of her in the 
 cafe's and the barracks.
 
 THE DEATH OF MAROZIA 115 
 
 They threatened her, and she laughed them 
 to scorn. She could have exiled them with 
 a word, but she would not dignify them with 
 such a sentence. She played with them as 
 some experimentalists love to play with 
 dangerous chemicals, just to see how far she 
 might dare to go. 
 
 " Put those two rats out of the way," said 
 old Feneac, her chief adviser, just before he 
 died. "Put your heel upon their necks, 
 Marozia, and have done with them once 
 and for all." 
 
 " No," she answered ; " whilst I let those 
 men move at large here in my own capital no 
 one will believe half a word they utter, but 
 if I lift my hand to them the world will say 
 that their story is true, Feneac, else I should 
 not have passed them by." 
 
 " Is there no truth in their tale ? " the brutal 
 old man had queried. 
 
 He knew well that there was, and Marozia 
 knew that he knew. That was why the hot 
 blood surged over her face and flooded her 
 throat with colour. 
 
 "I was only a girl then," she murmured, 
 "and I wanted toys." 
 
 " Toys and stepping-stones, my Queen," he 
 answered. " If you will not get rid of them, 
 at least see that the officers of the King's 
 Guard are of other blood than those who
 
 116 MAROZIA 
 
 now hold office. There is one who has his eyes 
 upon your husband's throne, and he will need 
 tools and stepping-stones. Promise me this, 
 and I will sleep in my grave in peace. I do 
 not think I could lie quiet in my grave if 
 that man filled the throne of Seconia." 
 
 "Rest in peace," she assured him. 
 " Mabon and I are firm in the saddle now ; 
 none can shift us." 
 
 He lay still for a little while, then opening 
 his tired eyes again, he said once more, 
 " Marozia, rid yourself of the rats." 
 
 Then he passed away, but the wilful Queen 
 would not take the old watch-dog's advice. 
 
 In a shabby little cafe' a dozen men were 
 sitting over their wine one night about a 
 month after the death of Feneac, and amongst 
 them were the two men he had called "the 
 rats." They still wore the uniform of the 
 King, and the wine they drank was paid for 
 out of the soldier's pay they drew from him. 
 All the sitters were uncovered, excepting one 
 man, who kept his face muffled in the folds 
 of his cloak. It was he who was speaking. 
 " Sirs," he said, " there is but one way out 
 of this matter, Marozia the Wanton must die." 
 
 " That has been said before by many men, 
 and yet Marozia lives," answered one. 
 
 " Others have failed because they have not 
 as much at stake as we have," rejoined the
 
 THE DEATH OF MAROZIA 117 
 
 muffled man. " Some have tried to get rid 
 of her out of jealousy, others for political 
 reasons, some have wanted her put aside 
 because they loved this land of Seconia, and 
 would not have a coquette on their country's 
 throne. Others again have desired her death 
 because she stood between them and their 
 ambitions. Here to-night we unite all these 
 reasons." 
 
 " Is there not one here who would gladly 
 step over Marozia's dead body, and the dead 
 body of her husband to a throne ? " whispered 
 one of the conspirators. 
 
 The muffled man muttered an oath, and his 
 hand, dropping to his dagger hilt, he half drew 
 the blade, but he put it back with an angry 
 jerk, and clenching his fist, leant far over 
 the table, and spoke in savage, menacing 
 tones. 
 
 " Each plays for his own stake, let each 
 look on his own winnings when the time 
 comes, as for me for the time I bring 
 
 pay." 
 
 He drew a heavy bag of metal from under 
 his cloak and pushed a little pile of gold 
 pieces in front of each man. Then there 
 was silence for a while, broken at last by 
 one who said : " I am willing to help in the 
 removal of Marozia, but I have nothing against 
 Mabon the King ; why should he die ? The
 
 118 MAROZIA 
 
 woman has bewitched him as she has bewitched 
 many another man." 
 
 The muffled man laughed a harsh, grating 
 laugh, which sounded strangely from amidst 
 the folds of his cloak. "Let Mabon live by 
 all means," he jeered. " Tell me how long 
 will it be before the knife is at our own 
 throats ? " He rose. " I must go now, for I 
 must be far away from Seconia when the the 
 removal of the woman takes place." 
 
 Five nights later a missive was placed in 
 the hands of Marozia the Queen. It ran : 
 " Double the palace guards to-night, and 
 put foreign officers in command of the 
 watch. Do not despise this warning for the 
 sake of the love that once was." 
 
 Marozia read the missive carefully ; then she 
 smiled disdainfully. "It is one of the ' rats ' 
 in a new role," she mused- " He has played 
 many parts, loving, cringing, threatening, con- 
 spiring, now warning me. What role will he 
 fill next, I wonder?" 
 
 She looked up and caught sight of herself 
 in a mirror that threw back her reflection 
 in full length. The sight pleased her. She 
 was beautiful still, and beauty was power, 
 and there was one coming to her Court 
 shortly, on whom she meant to try all her 
 witchery. 
 
 He was the monarch of a world- wide power
 
 THE DEATH OF MAROZIA 119 
 
 So she stood there dreaming, smiling at her- 
 self, and mapping out bigger schemes and 
 greater spheres of influence. 
 
 A soft footfall on the heavy carpet startled 
 her, and she turned to see the face of Mabon 
 the King, and immediately she crushed the 
 warning missive in her hand. " What is it ? " 
 she said. " I thought that we were not to 
 meet again until to-morrow morning?" 
 
 He held a note out towards her. "This 
 has just reached me," he said. 
 
 She waved it away with a pettish gesture of 
 her hand. "Oh, another chapter of your 
 Queen's misdeeds. I am very weary of it 
 all, dear." 
 
 She put forth both her hands and drew him 
 to her. " If you and I were only simple 
 peasant folk," she said, "with a little farm 
 of our own, how happy we might be." 
 
 He slipped his arm around her waist, and 
 let his head rest upon her heaving bosom, 
 whilst she toyed with his hair. Suddenly she 
 slipped one hand under his chin, and, turning 
 his face up, kissed him slowly with a long, 
 languorous kiss ; whilst a light like the light 
 of the stars in tropical skies came into her 
 heavy eyes. 
 
 Then he cried : " Marozia, some one warned 
 me not to share the Queen's apartments to- 
 night, that was why I came."
 
 120 MAROZIA 
 
 She told him then of the warning she had 
 received. 
 
 " Will you double the guards ? " he asked. 
 
 "Will you refuse to share the Queen's 
 apartments to-night ? " she cooed. 
 
 " I would sooner part with my crown," he 
 cried gaily. " Marozia, you make me drunken 
 with love," and, taking her hand in his, he led 
 her to her chamber, that beautiful chamber, 
 which neither King nor Queen should ever 
 leave again. 
 
 A couple of hours passed by and the Queen 
 awoke. For a moment she lay listening, 
 whilst the young King slumbered, his hair 
 shining dark against the snowy whiteness of 
 the pillow. Then she touched him with a 
 firm, cool hand and he awoke. 
 
 " What is it ? " 
 
 " Our enemies are upon us." 
 
 He sprang from the bed, just as the door 
 burst in with a crash. 
 
 The moonlight flashed across the bed- 
 chamber, and revealed Marozia in her night- 
 robe, tall and straight and lovely. Her head 
 was up in proud defiance, her body poised 
 firmly, one foot white and bare, was thrust 
 from under the hem of her robe, her glossy 
 hair streamed down her back in a long wave. 
 
 The King gave her just one look, then the 
 man in him awoke, and he threw himself in
 
 THE DEATH OF MAROZIA 121 
 
 front of her, as the assassins burst in upon 
 them. 
 
 The two foremost caught the Queen's eye, 
 and with a mocking laugh she cried : " Old 
 Feneac was right ; the ' rats ' have come." 
 
 Even the shadow of death could not daunt 
 this woman. 
 
 With a wild beast snarl, one of the assassins, 
 he who had been the first of all this beautiful, 
 wilful, wayward creature's loves, cried to the 
 King to stand aside and leave the Queen. 
 
 His answer was a man's answer. He sprang 
 upon the fellow and dashed him headlong to 
 the floor, and raised his voice in a rallying 
 call to his guards. One or two who were 
 faithful were down, dead, or dying. The rest 
 had fled cowards who could not be true to 
 their salt. 
 
 Perhaps in that awful moment Marozia 
 thought of that other soldier of the King's 
 Guard, that once she had toyed with; the 
 long - limbed Anglo-Saxon, who had stood 
 between her and destruction in the Perrin 
 Mountains beyond Relo. If so, she must 
 have known that her sins had found her out. 
 Had he been there to rally the guard, the 
 men would have stood and died for the Queen, 
 as common soldiers will when a stout heart 
 leads them. 
 
 She saw the young King fall, she saw his
 
 122 MAROZIA 
 
 | 
 
 youthful limbs stretched out across the path 
 that led to her. Then like wolves the cravens 
 came upon her, and the first dagger that was 
 plunged in her white breast was clenched in 
 the hand of a man who years before had 
 stolen on tiptoe under the blossoming fruit- 
 tree to steal kisses from her lips.
 
 IX 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE RED 
 FARM
 
 IX 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE 
 RED FARM 
 
 FOLKS called it the Red Farm, because the 
 farmhouse was built of reddish sandstone. 
 When old Michael Geany, who had lived in 
 it for thirty years, decided to leave Australia 
 for the purpose of visiting his native land, a 
 new tenant was found in the person of a 
 young and extremely handsome woman, who 
 rented the place under the name of Miss 
 Neilson. 
 
 No one knew who she was, or where she 
 came from, except possibly her Japanese 
 servant ; and as he either could not, or would 
 not, speak a word of English, nothing was 
 gained from him. 
 
 It soon became evident to the neighbours 
 that the new tenant at Red Farm did not 
 intend to do any farming, or receive any 
 visitors. She kept two women, whom she 
 had hired at Adelaide city, to do her house- 
 
 125
 
 126 MAROZIA 
 
 work, and a man to look after a black mare 
 which she rode every day, hot or cold, rain 
 or shine. 
 
 She never received any of the neighbours 
 who called in a friendly fashion to bid her 
 welcome to the district. When they rode 
 up to the farm in their hearty Australian 
 way, the Jap would open the door, take the 
 offered card, bow like a wooden image, and 
 shut the door in their faces. 
 
 She never went to church or chapel, and 
 never spoke to a soul. Folks saw her in the 
 early dawn, or in the glorious dusk of the 
 warm summer evenings, flying along on the 
 black hack that looked more like a race- 
 horse than anything else. She had a fine 
 figure, and even in that land of great horse- 
 men she was voted a marvel in the saddle. 
 She always jumped the mare over the stout 
 gate that led to the farm, whether going out 
 or going home ; and at times the market 
 gardeners going to the early market in the 
 city saw her race the mare at the fences in 
 the fields like a thing bewitched. 
 
 Naturally, she was the talk of the country- 
 side, and men and women speculated as to 
 whom she might be, and wondered whether a 
 clue to the enigma would ever turn up ; but 
 they were like blind children groping in a 
 strange field, and nothing came of their guess-
 
 ing. On one point, however, they were all 
 agreed, " She was not an Australian." 
 
 She did not look, walk, or ride like one. 
 Beyond that none of them got ; she was a 
 living mystery. 
 
 When one of the servants visited the little 
 township close by, curious women, and men 
 also, for that matter, made a point of cross- 
 examining them concerning the mistress of 
 the Red Farm ; but all that could be elicited 
 from this source was that the "Mystery" 
 spoke to no one, had no pets except her mare, 
 and a pretty little Japanese spaniel, never 
 received or wrote any letters or telegrams, 
 and passed nearly the whole of the time in 
 the house at the piano, singing in a language 
 that the servants did not understand. 
 
 " She's got the most wonderful voice I've 
 ever heard, and I've listened to Melba more 
 than once," vouchsafed one of the abigails 
 in a fit of unusual eloquence to the landlady 
 of the Green Grasshopper Hotel. 
 
 The months went by, and the mystery was 
 not solved, neither did the interest amongst 
 the neighbours abate an atom, for curiosity 
 is a hard thing to kill. Suddenly a new and 
 startling interest was given to the Red Farm. 
 
 In the early hours of a summer's morning, 
 a market gardener on his way cityward, was 
 scared pretty nearly out of his senses by see-
 
 128 MAROZIA 
 
 ing two wild - eyed servants running bare- 
 headed towards him on the highway. 
 
 He had scarce time to halt his horse ere 
 they scrambled into his cart amongst the 
 vegetables, gasping an incoherent tale of 
 murder. 
 
 The police were soon upon the scene, and 
 close on the heels of the police came Detective 
 Loder, a young man who had studied for the 
 Bar, but had thrown up that profession to 
 become a tracker of men. He was not two- 
 and-thirty at this time, and yet his record 
 was exceedingly brilliant. 
 
 In the Red Farm they found the dead body 
 of the beautiful woman who had been known 
 as the " Mystery." Crouching close to her 
 body, licking one of her small hands, was the 
 little Japanese spaniel. 
 
 " Post your men so as to keep the country 
 folk away, inspector," commanded Loder, " and 
 leave the rest to me, please." 
 
 " Certainly ; I've orders to let you have a 
 free hand ; but it's a clear case, clear as a 
 pike-staff," was the inspector's answer. 
 
 " Yes," mused Loder ; " these cases usually 
 are, but what is your theory ? " 
 
 " Why, the Jap servant has murdered his 
 mistress, and has bolted." 
 
 " Are you sure the Jap has bolted ? " 
 
 " Not a sign of him high or low."
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE RED FARM 129 
 
 " What was the Jap's motive ? " 
 
 " Oh, the usual thing loot." 
 
 Detective Loder pointed a silent finger at 
 the rich gems on the dead woman's fingers, 
 and passed on. The body of the beautiful 
 woman had been found lying upon a couch 
 in the drawing-room, fully clothed. The big 
 eyes were wide open, the hands clenched. 
 The lace upon the sleeves of her bodice was 
 torn as if she had fought hard for life ; on 
 her white throat the imprint of a strong hand 
 was plainly visible ; the marks of every finger, 
 and of the thumb, were there as if printed 
 in wax. 
 
 Loder examined the marks with infinite 
 care, and tried to fit his own hand to them, 
 but could not. The space between the little 
 finger and the thumb was too great. They 
 were the marks of a left hand a cruel, strong 
 hand, that had not known how to flinch. Very 
 carefully the detective examined the rooms ; 
 then he sent a note to a friend of his, a man 
 who got his living making clay models. 
 
 The note was curt. It simply said : " Come 
 at once with this messenger. I want you 
 to make a perfect model of a dead woman's 
 neck and throat." 
 
 Whilst the messenger was away on this 
 errand Loder made an exhaustive search 
 through the dead woman's personal property,
 
 130 MAROZIA 
 
 and when he had finished he said to the 
 inspector of police : " The dead woman had 
 a past, and a past she meant to conceal. I 
 have not found a solitary letter of any kind 
 excepting a few dry legal documents from her 
 lawyer in Adelaide relating to this farm. 
 There is no book from foreign parts with 
 her name or any one else's name attached, 
 no music of any sort near the piano ; she 
 must have played and sung from memory. 
 Her linen is unmarked. Her boxes and 
 trunks have all been carefully cleaned, so 
 that no label is left to give me a clue to 
 the land she came from. All this is not the 
 work of chance. She had an enemy, or 
 enemies, somewhere, and she feared being 
 traced." 
 
 " Haven't you found a photograph of the 
 woman anywhere ? " 
 
 " Not one. But there are a dozen portraits 
 of gentlemen, all taken by an amateur, and 
 mounted on unstamped cards, so that they 
 convey no clue. Still, I will keep them. 
 They may prove useful." 
 
 The two men went to the room where the 
 body lay, and Loder picked up the little 
 Japanese spaniel. As he did so the creature 
 moaned as if in pain. 
 
 " I'll take this to a ' vet,' " said the detective ; 
 " it's damaged."
 
 As he spoke his friend, the modeller, arrived. 
 He had often worked with Loder. 
 
 " Nasty business this, Loder eh ? " 
 
 " About as nasty as it can be. Come, and 
 I'll show you what I want." 
 
 The two knelt over the body. 
 
 " See those marks ? " It was Loder's 
 question. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, I want a clay model of this neck 
 and throat, exact in every particular. Make 
 it as if your life depended upon it, for a man's 
 life may hang on your skill." 
 
 The modeller nodded. 
 
 "You will use pure white clay for the 
 model, and place the marks of the fingers and 
 thumb just as they are now on the woman's 
 flesh. Use indigo for the bruises on the clay. 
 Don't hurry ; I want a perfect piece of work." 
 
 The modeller opened his bag and com- 
 menced at once. He was a swift, silent man 
 who loathed argument. 
 
 Loder took the spaniel in his arms and 
 went away to look for a veterinary surgeon. 
 
 " Broken ribs," said the " vet," after a quick 
 examination. " Looks as if a man had kicked 
 the dog." 
 
 The coroner's jury, who sat on the dead 
 body of the mysterious woman, brought in 
 a verdict of "Wilful Murder" against some
 
 132 MAROZIA 
 
 person unknown, and the police searched 
 Australia from end to end for the Japanese 
 servant, for he was the last person seen talking 
 to the mistress of Red Farm on the night 
 of the crime. No one had seen any stranger 
 come or go ; no one had heard any outcry. 
 No one, in fact, knew anything. The lawyers 
 who had let the farm had received their year's 
 rent in advance, and had been satisfied to 
 ask no questions. 
 
 The woman's banker knew absolutely 
 nothing about her except that she had 
 deposited a large sum of money at his bank 
 in the name of Miss Evaline Neilson, most 
 of which still remained unclaimed. Every- 
 body, excepting Loder, believed the Jap had 
 committed the crime; he held other views, 
 which, however, he kept to himself. 
 
 Six months elapsed and not a clue was 
 found, when Loder astonished his chief by 
 asking to be sent to Tokio to search for the 
 assassin. 
 
 " Got a clue eh ? " asked the great man. 
 
 " Hardly that ; but if that Jap had 
 remained in Australia alive, we would have 
 heard of him by now. Tokio is the place 
 to seek for him." 
 
 The chief, who believed in Loder, sent him 
 to Japan by the next boat, and on the way 
 over he reviewed all the clues in his possession.
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE RED FARM 133 
 
 First there was the model of the woman's 
 throat and neck, with the finger-marks upon 
 it ; a photo of the victim, which he had had 
 taken by the best expert in Australia ; the 
 rings the woman had worn ; a tress of her 
 hair; a minute written description of the 
 victim, detailing her height, the colour of 
 her eyes, the size of the boots and gloves 
 she wore. It was a gem in its way that 
 description. Nothing was omitted com- 
 plexion, teeth, eyebrows, ears, size of mouth, 
 everything was set down in terse, forceful 
 English. 
 
 Next came the portraits found in her rooms 
 none of them remarkable, yet all were of 
 value ; and, lastly, the Japanese spaniel, now 
 quite recovered from its wounds, a playful, 
 pretty pet, fond of being coddled by any one 
 who would pet it. 
 
 Loder jotted down his impressions, and 
 then read his notes carefully, after which he 
 tore them up and tossed them into the sea. 
 His notes ran : 
 
 " Motives certainly not robbery, for the 
 woman's jewellery and a fair sum in cash in 
 the house was not touched. It was not the 
 outcome of a quarrel, for the victim was lying 
 on a couch smoking cigarettes when attacked, 
 as the half-smoked end of a cigarette was in 
 the fold of her bodice, and it had burnt a
 
 134 MAROZIA 
 
 small hole in the lace before it went out. 
 There were a dozen cigarette - ends in an 
 ash-tray beside the couch, and they were of 
 the same make as the one half smoked. It 
 was not the Jap who killed her, for the Jap 
 was a small man, and had slender hands 
 with short fingers, as his gloves proved, 
 and the marks on the model could only be 
 covered by a man with a hand like a saddle- 
 flap. The motive might have been revenge, 
 or it might have been political. If the Jap 
 did not murder the woman, what had become 
 of the Jap? 
 
 " I feel like a school-boy with a ball of 
 knotted string; I can't find any ends to 
 catch hold of. But I've got the string, and 
 the end may turn up in Tokio ; and it strikes 
 me that I shall find a little, brown man at 
 one end of my string and a big, white man 
 at the other." 
 
 Loder spent three months in Tokio and 
 learnt nothing. Then he went on to Pekin 
 and engaged the best Chinese detective he 
 could get hold of, and laid his facts before 
 him, and for nearly a year the pair worked 
 unceasingly, but without avail. Then one 
 day Yun Heo came to him and laid two 
 photographs on the table. One was his own 
 portrait of the dead woman of the Red Farm, 
 the other was a portrait of the same woman
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE RED FARM 135 
 
 dressed in richest furs. The latter bore the 
 name of a photographer in Port Arthur. 
 
 An hour later the two men were en route 
 for what was then the greatest Russian strong- 
 hold in the Far East. A little money well 
 spent and a few questions adroitly put to 
 the photographer told them who the woman 
 was. Her name does not matter. She had 
 been a noted Polish singer, and had lived in 
 Port Arthur for a long time two years 
 perhaps. 
 
 " Had she any lovers ? " 
 
 The photographer threw out his hands. 
 " What a question for Monsieur to ask 
 that kind of woman always had lovers." 
 
 " Any lovers in particular ? " 
 
 A little more gold changed hands, and the 
 photographer looked at the portraits the 
 detective had taken from the Red Farm. 
 He picked out one. 
 
 "That is Captain Ignatiff Surranoff. He 
 was the last, and, oh yes, he had seemed very 
 much enamoured at the time." 
 
 Loder took the little Japanese spaniel 
 under his arm and went the rounds of Port 
 Arthur for a walk. One night in a caf the 
 spaniel sprang from his lap and ran barking 
 at the heels of a big man in an officer's 
 uniform, who had just brushed past. The 
 man turned with a curse and kicked wickedly
 
 136 MAROZIA 
 
 at the dog, but the creature seemed to be on 
 the alert for just such a reception, and dodged 
 under a table. The man's face was livid. 
 
 Loder knew the officer for the original of 
 the photo in his pocket. He spoke hurriedly 
 to the Chinese detective. 
 
 "Go and calm the dog and speak rudely 
 to the man. I will pay well." 
 
 Yun Heo rose and did as he was bidden. 
 In a burst of fury the Russian caught the 
 Chinaman by the throat with his left hand, 
 and held him until he sank limply to the 
 floor ; then he strode out of the cafe with the 
 spaniel yapping at his heels. In his own 
 room Loder measured the marks on the 
 Chinaman's throat, and smiled. Yun Heo 
 made a grimace that was very eloquent. 
 Then Loder compared the measurements he 
 had taken with the marks on the clay- model 
 he had brought from Australia, and again he 
 smiled. A week later Loder had proof that 
 the Russian officer was absent from duty on 
 leave at the time the murder was committed 
 in the Red Farm. 
 
 Then he went to the military commander 
 of the port and laid his evidence before him. 
 The next day he called again. The com- 
 mander met him with a grave face. 
 
 "You want to take that man back to 
 Australia with you ? " he said.
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE RED FARM 137 
 
 "Yes," answered Loder; "justice wants 
 him in Australia for murder." 
 
 "Justice wanted him in Port Arthur for 
 treason," was the quiet reply, "and justice 
 has him. He was shot this morning. You 
 can see his body if you like." 
 
 " Why was he shot ? " 
 
 " He was suspected of having sold plans 
 of our defences to the Japanese, using his 
 mistress as a go-between. She betrayed us, 
 then betrayed him by clearing out to Australia 
 with the proceeds of his treachery ; he followed 
 her and killed her. He confessed it all when 
 I arrested him and laid your murder proofs 
 before him." 
 
 " But what became of the Japanese man- 
 servant?" cried Loder. 
 
 " There was no Japanese man-servant. It 
 was a Jap woman in disguise. She is probably 
 in her own country at this moment. Whilst 
 you were looking for a man, she, doubtless, 
 walked away under your nose as a woman. 
 I am grateful to you, sir, for having put a 
 traitor into my hands ; had I handed him 
 over to you he might have escaped, and 
 he knew too much for me to run the risk. 
 Have a glass of champagne, sir; your work 
 is done, and well done."
 
 X 
 
 HASSAN, THE NUBIAN 
 
 A PARTY of prospectors, equipped by a big 
 London mining firm, were camped in the 
 Egyptian desert. 
 
 They had had the usual run of vicissitudes 
 that come to treasure-seekers, and yet they 
 were in no way down-hearted. Men of their 
 type take a great deal of knocking about 
 before they are beaten, for your real gold- 
 seeker loves danger for danger's sake. The 
 man who does not soon ceases to be a pioneer. 
 
 This party had quitted Port Soudan in an 
 Arab dhow, which had been picked up by a 
 sudden gale and dashed upon the coast. The 
 men had lost pretty nearly all their worldly 
 goods in the wreck ; but no lives had paid 
 forfeit to fortune, and they were satisfied. 
 
 They looked a picturesque group as they 
 crouched near the small fire that the Arab 
 servants had made for them. They were all 
 dressed in their pyjamas, for the gale had 
 
 141
 
 142 MAROZIA 
 
 sprung up in the night, and had left them 
 scant time to think of the niceties of the 
 toilet. Most of them had buckled their 
 revolver and cartridge - belts around them, 
 and that was about all they had time to do. 
 
 The party consisted of seven Englishmen 
 and five Arabs. Three other Arabs had been 
 despatched in search of help. An English 
 mining party can always get help in the East, 
 because the people know that they will be 
 well paid for any service they may render. 
 The wind came whispering across the desert, 
 not a boisterous wind, but chill enough to 
 set the teeth of the adventurers chattering. 
 The Arabs knew the night breeze well. They 
 had a saying concerning it, which runs: 
 " The soft night air will not lift the sand ; 
 but it will lay a man down." 
 
 There was one young fellow in the English 
 ranks, little more than a boy, a clean-cut, 
 hardy youngster, with high courage written 
 all over him. He crouched as close as he 
 could get to the little fire, and said nothing 
 in the way of complaint, for he was one who 
 knew how to take the gall with the honey, 
 but his teeth were clipping together until they 
 rattled, and his hands were shaking violently. 
 
 An old Arab with a grave face and deep-set, 
 sombre eyes was watching him. He spoke at 
 last to the leader of the expedition. "The
 
 HASSAN, THE NUBIAN H3 
 
 chill from the desert has got into the young 
 man's bones. If he is not attended to 
 now, he will be food for vultures in a few 
 hours." 
 
 " What can be done ? " was the answer. 
 "We have no tents, no clothes, no shelter." 
 
 The Arab rose from his squatting position, 
 and began to scoop a shallow hole in the 
 sand. This did not take long to do. 
 
 " Lay the young man in this hole," com- 
 manded the Arab, and the Englishman obeyed 
 promptly, and in silence. 
 
 The Arab covered the youth over with 
 sand, and pressed it firm with his feet, leaving 
 nothing exposed but the face, and still the 
 teeth chattered incessantly. Taking a few 
 handfuls of dried camel-dung, the Arab lit 
 a small fire on the sand over the youth's chest, 
 and another at his feet. Then he pushed the 
 mouthpiece of his hookah between the twitch- 
 ing lips of the sick lad. " Smoke ! " he com- 
 manded tersely. " Fill your lungs with smoke, 
 or to-morrow you will go the long journey." 
 
 The youngster obeyed mechanically, and as 
 the warmth from the fires ate its way down 
 through the sand into his flesh, a pleasant 
 drowsiness came over him, and he slept ; and 
 as he slumbered perspiration came out upon 
 his forehead like dew. The ancient son of 
 the desert noted it, and smiled.
 
 144 MAROZIA 
 
 " You think he will win through all right ? " 
 demanded the leader, who had noted the 
 smile. 
 
 "Allah has him in his keeping," was the 
 grave reply. " He will be very weak when 
 he awakes, but a good meal and a sunbath 
 will make him as if the things of this night 
 had never been, for he is young, the blood 
 in his veins is warm, and the marrow in his 
 bones is untouched by disease or by wild 
 living." 
 
 As the words left his lips there came a 
 sound on the night air, the queer, uncanny 
 swish swish of camels moving swiftly on 
 sand. 
 
 It was a relief party coming from a neigh- 
 bouring village. There was little noise to 
 disturb the sleeper, for the real Arabs are a 
 silent folk, who loathe noise of any kind. 
 The camels were drawn round the camp-fire 
 in a circle ; a jerk upon a nose-line brought 
 each beast to its knees. Tents, clothes, and 
 food were unpacked, and an air of comfort 
 soon pervaded the spot. Dry clothes first, 
 then food and steaming coffee, then tobacco ; 
 and the gold-seekers were filled with content 
 as they sprawled by the big camp-fire that 
 had taken the place of the small heap of 
 embers. 
 
 Amongst the newcomers was a man of
 
 HASSAN, THE NUBIAN 145 
 
 immense physique, a Nubian, so black that 
 his oiled face looked like ebon velvet. He 
 would have seemed a big man in any company 
 of men, and yet, his head was so immense 
 that it looked too large for his body. There 
 was not a hair upon his face lips, cheeks, 
 and chin were bare, and his craggy brows 
 overhung a pair of eyes that, though sunk 
 far back in his head, were wonderfully luminous. 
 It was a magnetic face, a face that spoke 
 for power, for overmastering will, for indomit- 
 able purpose, courage, % and intellectual resource. 
 
 He was a master of tongues, for he spoke 
 to the black servants in their own dialect, to 
 the Arabs in Arabic, and to the English in 
 the language of the land of their nativity, and 
 he spoke to all in the tones of one who is used 
 to the deference of his fellow-men. A strange 
 personage to find at the head of a small relief 
 party on the fringe of the Egy tian desert. 
 
 The Arabs and the natives called him a 
 magician, a seer, a reader of the past and the 
 future, a being who could draw the curtain 
 away from a soul and leave it naked. The 
 white tourists who came to the land of the 
 Pharaohs to carve their initials upon the 
 pyramids, and make the stillness of the Nile 
 nights hideous with music-hall ballads, called 
 him out of the shallowness of their philosophy 
 " a fakir and a trickster." 
 
 K
 
 146 MAROZIA 
 
 He had been a power in the land for many 
 a long year, this Nubian. Men who made 
 war came to him to predict results. Matrons 
 who were childless came to him to buy charms. 
 
 Whilst the prospectors sat smoking round 
 the bivouac fire, the Nubian sat cross-legged 
 and said no word. He did not even listen, 
 but gazed across the smoke that rose from 
 the burning dung with wide-open eyes, and 
 the Arabs watched him, wondering as they 
 watched. 
 
 "Hush 1 " said one to another who was 
 sharpening his knife on a stone. " Hush, the 
 Nubian is reading the future fate of some 
 man. It may be it is thine, fool, disturb him 
 not," and the man reproved laid down his 
 knife without a word. 
 
 After a time the Nubian drew a long, deep 
 breath, and pressed the inside of his fingers 
 against his eyes, as one does who has grown 
 weary gazing too long upon the sun. Then 
 he reached for his hookah and smoked in 
 silence. None of the Arabs asked anything 
 of him, but the Englishman who had charge 
 of the expedition said, with just a shadow of 
 a sarcastic smile playing under his moustache : 
 " Is it permitted that a man ask a question ? " 
 
 The Nubian gazed full at the speaker, and 
 bowed his head gravely. 
 
 " You claim to be able to read men's fate ? "
 
 HASSAN, THE NUBIAN 147 
 
 " I claim nothing." 
 
 "Are there any here whose future you 
 know ? " 
 
 A silence was upon the camp so intense 
 that nothing reached the ear but the working 
 of the camels' jaws as they chewed the cud in 
 the starlight. 
 
 " There are two here whose destiny I know." 
 
 " Will you name the two and detail the 
 destiny ? " 
 
 The Nubian's great, strong face never moved 
 a muscle. " You are one, and the sick lad in 
 the sand is the other." 
 
 " What is my fate to be ? " 
 
 The Nubian bent forward. "You ask me 
 to lift the veil from the future ? " 
 
 " If you can." 
 
 " You are a bold man, and you will die as 
 you have lived, boldly, die with a weapon in 
 your hand, before the Nile floods its banks 
 again. I have seen the sands red with your 
 blood. Your grave will lie in the desert. 
 Your enterprise will fail, and all who march 
 with you will feed the vultures all excepting 
 one." 
 
 The English leader's eyelids drew close 
 together, until the eyes looked just like two 
 tiny slits of blue steel flashing through the 
 lashes, and he gazed back unflinchingly at the 
 speaker.
 
 148 MAROZIA 
 
 " So that is to be my fate, is it ? " 
 
 " That is your fate." 
 
 " And what is to be the fate of the lad who 
 sleeps in the sand ? " 
 
 The Nubian crouched further forward, his 
 big nostrils, the nostrils of the fighting man, 
 closing and expanding in his excitement. 
 " The young lad belongs to the desert, though 
 he was born in other lands. The desert 
 cradles him to-night, it will be his cradle 
 always, never his grave. He will live to be 
 rich and great, he shall sit at the councils of 
 the mighty, and men who move armies shall 
 hang upon his words as upon the words of an 
 oracle. Neither fire nor steel, pestilence nor 
 famine shall touch him. The desert will be a 
 mantle of death to you, a mantle of fortune 
 to him." 
 
 The Arabs gazed pitifully at the English- 
 man, for to them he was as one who stood 
 within the very shadow of death. He reached 
 out his hand and touched the Nubian on the 
 knee, and his hand was firm and cool. 
 
 " Give me some sign that you speak the 
 truth." 
 
 The Nubian answered : " The blind always 
 seek for a sign, yet I will give it you because 
 your heart is stout. Put your hand in under 
 the sand, draw from the young man's waist 
 the belt that he wears. Three cartridges shall
 
 HASSAN, THE NUBIAN 149 
 
 be found missing from the right - hand side, 
 near the buckle, and two chambers of his 
 revolver shall be found empty, the rest are 
 full." 
 
 Slowly and carefully, so as not to rouse 
 the sleeper, the leader slipped his arm in 
 under the sand and undid the buckle of the 
 belt and drew it forth. The three cartridges 
 were missing from the right-hand side of the 
 buckle, two chambers of the revolver were 
 empty, the rest were full. 
 
 " What do you make of it ? " demanded 
 one of the gold-seekers of his leader. "The 
 Nubian couldn't have seen the belt or the 
 gun, for the boy swam ashore in the dark, 
 and was a foot under the sand, before the 
 black came to our camp. It gives me the 
 creeps along the spine." 
 
 " Does it, my lad ? Well, if he has spoken 
 the truth, you and I are going to get some- 
 thing worse than the creeps in our spines 
 before old Nile brings the mud down again." 
 
 " Do you believe it, Cap ? " 
 
 " I believe in destiny, whether this man is its 
 mouthpiece or not. A few months will tell." 
 
 He knocked the cold ashes from his pipe, 
 and, stretching his long limbs out by the fire, 
 pillowed his head on his arm and slept like 
 a child. f 
 
 The Nubian, who had been watching him
 
 150 MAROZIA 
 
 with unwinking eyes, touched an Arab on 
 the shoulder. 
 
 " See," he said, " that Englishman believes, 
 yet he sleeps. That is why they overrun the 
 world." 
 
 Four months have passed away. Far out 
 in the desert a little band of desperate men 
 are battling for dear life against impossible 
 odds. It is the same party we saw ship- 
 wrecked on the desert's coastal fringe. They 
 have made a breast- work of kneeling camels, 
 knee-halting the animals and tethering them 
 head to tail. Arabs and Englishmen have 
 fought well, side by side, hour after hour. 
 They hold their ground against the unkempt, 
 wild - haired horde that has risen like locusts 
 in their track, but now the ammunition has 
 run out, and they are waiting for the rush 
 they know must soon come, the rush and the 
 wild hand-to-hand fight, the swift stabbing 
 of spears, and then the long long sleep. 
 
 The leader of the party puts his hand 
 lovingly and pitifully on the lean shoulder 
 of the lad who is standing by his side, hold- 
 ing an empty Winchester clubbed ready for 
 action. He has used that Winchester with 
 deadly effect during the fight, and the light 
 of battle is still in his eyes, the flush of anger 
 still upon his boyish cheeks.
 
 HASSAN, THE NUBIAN 151 
 
 An Arab touches the English leader with a 
 long, brown finger. " What is it, Ben Ali ? " 
 
 "We have one fast camel ; one can escape 
 and carry the news. My tribe will avenge 
 me, your people will avenge you. These 
 dogs," he pointed scornfully towards the mob 
 of wild creatures in the distance, "these 
 dogs must not go unpaid." 
 
 " A glad light jumped into the Englishman's 
 eyes. " Good, Ben Ali, bring the fast riding- 
 camel here." 
 
 The Arab went swiftly to his task. 
 
 " Who goes ? " asked the lad wonderingly. 
 
 "You do." 
 
 " I'm d d if I do I I stay to see it out 
 with the rest." 
 
 " You obey orders. Take the news to Ben 
 Ali's tribe, then make your way to London 
 and give these plans and this letter to my 
 chief. They are the plans and map of the 
 biggest thing found in Egypt since the days 
 of the Pharaohs. Tell the chief that I rely 
 upon him not to let my widow starve. Now, 
 off with you ; the Fuzzies are coming." 
 
 He picked up the lad by the scruff of the 
 neck and the seat of the trousers, and tossed 
 him on to the camel. Ben Ali cried out 
 shrilly to the beast in Arabic, and it sped 
 away like a bullet from a barrel. 
 
 Then came the thud of many naked feet,
 
 152 MAROZIA 
 
 wild yells from many throats, a cloud of desert 
 dust, a clash of many spears, a bold leonine 
 cheer from behind the camel rampart, a few 
 moments of hacking and hewing, and then 
 the barbarian horde looked down upon the 
 little ring of dead, and the vultures flying 
 high slanted their wings and drew steadily 
 nearer and nearer.
 
 XI 
 A SPORTING CHANCE
 
 XI 
 A SPORTING CHANCE 
 
 IT was a hot day, hot even for the north-west 
 coast of West Australia, and it can be so hot 
 there in midsummer that the tar will run from 
 the deck seams on the pearling fleet like honey 
 from an upturned comb. 
 
 It was running this day, and bubbling as it 
 ran, as the Dirk Hattrick rose and fell lazily 
 to the sleepy swell of the ocean. There was 
 not air enough moving to have fluttered a 
 cobweb on a thistle stalk. Even the seagulls 
 seemed to bake in that blistering heat, as 
 they hung heavily upon the wing, between 
 the blue sky and the blue water. 
 
 The man at the wheel, a Kanaka, naked as 
 Adam, except for a scanty loin-cloth of dirty 
 calico, drowsed as he stood at his post. A 
 Kanaka is always very much awake, or very 
 much asleep ; he never " thinks " he has 
 nothing to think with. He dreams or he 
 acts. In the waist of the craft four men 
 
 155
 
 156 MAROZIA 
 
 were squatting, gambling ; three Chinamen 
 and an Englishman. 
 
 The Celestials were all big, gaunt men, 
 with hard, grim faces. Dolts who know 
 nothing of Chinamen, love to write and 
 speak of them as a race who possess little 
 or no physical courage, but men who have 
 foregathered with them know better. The 
 Englishman was of a type common to the 
 Antipodes a man sent from home by his 
 own people because of his inherent lawless- 
 ness ; a remittance man, paid by his relations 
 so much per annum to give the white cliffs 
 of Dover a wide berth. Little those at home 
 cared where he went, how he lived, or how 
 soon he died, providing he lived and died 
 away from all who knew his antecedents, 
 under an assumed name. You meet those 
 men in all the unmapped corners of the 
 earth ; as a rule, they are hard drinkers 
 when they can get liquor. Nine out of 
 every dozen are gamblers, and will play for 
 their boots when they have lost all else. 
 Seven out of every twelve will fight like 
 wild cats when there is any fighting to be 
 done. About four in a thousand will work 
 steadily for a livelihood. They will gibe 
 with venom-tipped tongues at the country 
 that bred them, and rail night or day at all 
 her institutions, and promptly drive a fist
 
 A SPORTING CHANCE 157 
 
 into the mouth of the foreigner who dares 
 to do the same. 
 
 This man was one of that type. He had 
 drifted on to the north-west coast, coming 
 from no man knew where. Tropic suns had 
 burnt his fair skin saddle brown ; rough usage 
 had made his hands horny and hard. A livid 
 scar ran from his hair to his right eyebrow, 
 and one ear was missing. Once an in- 
 quisitive newspaper man, travelling on the 
 coast in search of local colour for a series of 
 articles, had asked him what had become of 
 that ear, and he had replied in his cold, 
 sneering fashion that "he had lost it at a 
 prayer meeting " ; but the look that accom- 
 panied the words sent the scribe out of the 
 drinking shanty with cold sweat trickling 
 down his spine. 
 
 It was considered a serious breach of 
 etiquette in those days, out there on the 
 fringe of the world, where the dregs of the 
 East and the West met, to ask a man how 
 he lost a limb or came by a scar, unless, of 
 course, you were looking for a little recrea- 
 tion in the shape of a rough-and-tumble fight. 
 If you happened to have yearnings that way, 
 you were a glutton if your yearnings were 
 not soon satisfied. 
 
 This Englishman was not of the wilfully 
 provocative order of biped, but no man ever
 
 158 MAROZIA 
 
 saw him turn his back upon a quarrel ; and 
 when he did fight he fought with the cold 
 ferocity that never spares. In size and make 
 he would have passed for a twin brother to 
 John Burns; broad in the shoulder, narrow 
 in the flank, deep of chest, quick as a flash 
 in his movements ; a bad man to fasten a 
 quarrel on at any time. 
 
 He had made a name for himself during the 
 few months he hung about on the coast. The 
 wildest of the whites and they were among 
 the wildest blades on earth soon learnt to 
 let him alone. Runaway sailors, disgraced 
 captains and officers of ships, escaped convicts 
 from Noumea and other penal settlements, 
 rankers, desperate gamblers from the Pacific 
 slope, outcasts and outlaws from China and 
 Japan, learnt to know and respect him by 
 the only law that appealed to them the law 
 of the heavy hand and unblenching courage. 
 
 Then a letter came to him bearing the 
 post-mark "Manchester, England," and he, 
 who had been well-nigh penniless, became 
 possessed of funds, and the coast knew him 
 for what he was " a remittance man." With 
 the money that letter contained he went into 
 partnership with three Chinamen who owned 
 a pearling lugger, and on this blazing hot day 
 when he conies into our story the lugger was 
 returning from the first trip to the oyster beds,
 
 A SPORTING CHANCE 159 
 
 having had as successful a season as any boat 
 in the fleet. The crew of the Dirk Hattrick 
 consisted of the Englishman, the three China- 
 men, a Kanaka, four cut-throat-looking Malays, 
 and an American negro. 
 
 The four men were not gambling for money. 
 They had put aside enough pearls to pay the 
 wages of the crew, and the wear and tear of 
 the boat, and had divided the rest into four 
 equal parts. Then the Englishman had pro- 
 posed that they should kill the time on the 
 home run with a little quiet gamble. On 
 the instant the Chinaman had produced a 
 pack of cards, and each man sat or squatted 
 on deck with his pearls in a small basin beside 
 him. Coolly and calmly the Englishman had 
 shuffled the cards, examining them intently ; 
 then, with a quiet smile, he had tossed them 
 over the side. 
 
 " Wha' for?" demanded one of the Celestials. 
 
 " I want a sporting chance. Those cards 
 were marked, every one of 'em." 
 
 The Chinaman pushed his half-drawn knife 
 back into his belt. " Welley good," he said, 
 with a slow smile. " You show cards." 
 
 The Englishman produced a pack and 
 tossed it down carelessly. The Chinamen 
 all scrutinised the pasteboards carefully, and 
 one by one tore them across, and laid the 
 debris in a little pile.
 
 160 MAROZIA 
 
 " Smell a rat eh ? " asked the Englishman. 
 
 " Welley muchee rats ; all marked," was 
 the bland response. " Flaps you got dice-box." 
 
 The Englishman had not, but the negro 
 cook had, and two sets of dice. In one set 
 a loaded die was found, and in the other a 
 die that had been so artfully filed that the 
 ace turned up every time it was turned out 
 of the box in a certain manner. Poker dice 
 is a fascinating game to play when the stakes 
 happen to be heavy, but it is not profitable 
 when the dice are either filed or loaded, unless 
 you happen to be the man who knows of the 
 manipulation of the bones. 
 
 At last the prospective gamblers were 
 satisfied that all had a fair sporting chance, 
 and the game began. For two hours the 
 Englishman lost steadily, and the pearls in 
 his china bowl were dwindling rapidly. 
 Suddenly he reached out and caught Lung 
 Ho by the wrist, and gave a wrench that 
 would have cracked the bone in a weaker 
 arm. Lung Ho was holding the dice-box 
 at the time, and was just about to throw. 
 As the Englishman twisted the yellow wrist 
 one of the dice was seen to lie in the hollow 
 of his palm, kept there by his cunningly bent 
 thumb. He had palmed it, and had slid a 
 loaded die into the box. A nasty glitter 
 came into the Englishman's eyes.
 
 A SPORTING CHANCE 161 
 
 " You are cheating, you yellow dog ! " he 
 growled. 
 
 " No cheat ; me a Clistian." 
 
 " A nice Christian. How did one of those 
 dice get into your palm ? " 
 
 A look of ineffable wonder grew on the 
 pagan's face. "Alice same accident; mus' 
 a slipp' down my sleeve." 
 
 The Englishman reached out his hand again, 
 and this time he took hold of the basin that 
 held Lung Ho's pearls. 
 
 " Wha' for ? " shrilled the Celestial. 
 
 "I'll mind 'em ; they might slip up your 
 sleeve," was the laconic answer. 
 
 The next moment a yellow fury, knife in 
 hand, was on top of the Englishman ; but the 
 negro cook kicked the pagan on the side of 
 the head and allowed the Englishman to rise. 
 Forty seconds later the white man and the 
 black were battling for dear life against the 
 whole of the brown and yellow crew. They 
 fought well, but the odds were too heavy, 
 for the Kanaka and the Malays joined forces 
 with the Chinamen. A knife-thrust supple- 
 mented by a smashing blow on the head 
 with a piece of lead piping, had strewn the 
 negro out very limp. As for the English- 
 man, he was a sight to be remembered. 
 His face had a gash in it from which the 
 blood flowed down on to his cheek, and
 
 162 MAROZIA 
 
 there were many ugly bruises caused by kick- 
 ing feet. Yet, when they propped him up 
 with his hands bound behind him, he dis- 
 played no sign of fear. His eyes fell upon 
 the form of a Kanaka lying very still, with 
 his forehead pillowed on his arm. 
 
 " Got that one, anyhow," he snarled. 
 
 "Gotee two more," put in Wing Fut 
 calmly. " Lookee at Lung Ho." 
 
 The Englishman looked and saw Lung 
 squatting down a couple of yards away. 
 The Chinaman coughed in a peculiar fashion 
 every now and again, and a little froth and 
 blood came to his lips each time his chest 
 heaved. A tyro might not have thought 
 much of that cough, but it was very eloquent 
 to a man who had seen a knife used in brawls 
 as often as the Englishman had. 
 
 "Yes," he said, "I think I've got friend 
 Lung also ; he won't have any more accidents 
 with dice." 
 
 Lung Ho heard this pleasantry, and smiled 
 a sickly, ghastly, almost post-mortem kind of 
 smile, for Lung, though a cheat, was game 
 to the marrow. 
 
 The other man who had been annexed was 
 a Malay the negro had accounted for him 
 and to judge from the way in which he lay 
 curled up, his account was permanently settled 
 and receipted.
 
 A SPORTING CHANCE 163 
 
 Lung Ho's pearls were reverently put away, 
 to be sent to his relatives in Tientsin. The 
 negro's wages and the Englishman's pearls 
 were divided amongst the survivors. Then 
 Wing Fut, with no trace of anger in his 
 soft voice, said to the Englishman : " You 
 Clistian, you better play now." 
 
 " I don't think praying will do me much 
 good, Wing. What are you going to do 
 with me and the nigger?" 
 
 Wing touched the hilt of his knife in a 
 casual way, and smiled again. " Velly qulick 
 way," he remarked philosophically. ** P'laps," 
 he added, as an after-thought, " p'laps it hurtee 
 lill bit at first." 
 
 "Look here, Wing," came the quiet 
 response, " why not give us a sporting chance ; 
 the whole thing has been a gamble, you 
 know." 
 
 Wing nodded pleasantly. The world might 
 own a greater gambler than he, but it is 
 doubtful. " Plenty big gamble this time, eh ? 
 You lose, no come out top sides, eh ? " 
 
 Wing spoke as if a human life was of no 
 more account than an oyster shell in his eyes. 
 Maybe it was not; lots of Asiatics are built 
 that way. 
 
 " That's so, Wing," responded the English- 
 man ; "the nigger and I have got the loser's 
 end of the purse come out ' bottom sides,'
 
 164 MAROZIA 
 
 as you yellow pagans say so why not let the 
 knife alone now and give us a sporting 
 chance ? " 
 
 " No savee." 
 
 " Well, untie our hands, and pitch us over 
 the side ; we can swim till we drown." 
 
 Wing turned his oval eyes on the slowly 
 heaving sea ; no land anywhere in sight, no 
 ship, nothing but water as far as human eyes 
 could reach. " You likee it that way ? " he 
 asked. 
 
 "Can't say I like it that way," was the 
 reckless response, "but I'd rather swim and 
 swim until I drown, than be stuck in cold 
 blood like a calf; it's a sort of fight to a 
 finish, you know." 
 
 Wing beckoned his friends and had a word 
 with them, and then he cut the nigger's bonds 
 and heaved him over the side like a log. He 
 began to swim as soon as he struck the water. 
 
 " Goo' - bye," said Wing cheerily, as he 
 sent the Englishman to join the black. Lean- 
 ing lazily over the stern the brown-and-yellow 
 men watched the black man and the white 
 swimming for life, and made bets as to which 
 would give up and sink first. Both were 
 splendid swimmers ; hour after hour they 
 swam on, every now and again turning upon 
 their backs to float, until the blistering sun 
 made them turn face downwards once more.
 
 A SPORTING CHANCE 165 
 
 As the lugger drifted out of sight the sport- 
 ing instinct woke in Wing's pagan soul ; he 
 picked up a small plank. " That carry one," 
 he soliloquised, and dropped it, unseen by his 
 friends, into the sea, and went forward to have 
 his chow. 
 
 Swimming like a pair of otters the two 
 castaways came suddenly abreast of that 
 small plank, and each grabbed it. But under 
 their combined weight it dipped and went 
 under. 
 
 " Only carry one, boss," gasped the black. 
 He was nearly beaten, for in spite of 
 herculean strength, and amazing hardihood, 
 his wound was telling upon him, 
 
 For a moment the Englishman wrestled 
 with temptation ; then he remembered that 
 the nigger had risked his life to help in the 
 fight. 
 
 " Get up," he muttered, and, steadying the 
 plank, he helped the black out of the water. 
 Then he said : " You've got a sporting chance ; 
 a lugger may pick you up." And he swam 
 away in the darkness to his fate.
 
 XII 
 THE HAUNTED MAN
 
 XII 
 THE HAUNTED MAN 
 
 THE packed court was hushed. The jurymen, 
 leaning forward in their places with strained, 
 eager faces, listened with rapt attention to the 
 silver-tongued orator who was pleading with 
 almost matchless eloquence for a man's life. 
 
 He did not merely talk, this man who 
 fronted the jury in that stifling court-house. 
 He was an actor, if ever one lived, as much 
 an actor as Bernhardt or Irving at the height 
 of their fame ; the court-house was the theatre 
 he loved, a jury the audience his soul yearned 
 for. 
 
 He never did things as other advocates did ; 
 his line of defence was always original, always 
 powerful, seldom abortive. He knew a jury 
 the moment his eyes fell upon them, knew 
 what method he would have to adopt to 
 win them. He could be coldly analytical, 
 dignified, dramatic to the verge of melodrama. 
 He could woo with soft words, and soften 
 
 169
 
 170 MAROZIA 
 
 hearts that seemed as hard as grey granite. 
 He could be pitiful, tender, scornful, a mock- 
 ing, gibing, jeering devil. When it suited him 
 to do so he could take the chain of evidence 
 and undo it patiently, link by link, until it 
 lay before the eyes of jurors a heaped-up mass 
 of odds and ends unworthy of a sane man's 
 consideration. At other times he would 
 throw analysis to the dogs and depend upon 
 his personal magnetism, upon the marvellous 
 witchery of his silvery voice. 
 
 He would appeal to the elementary passions 
 of the jury, and, lifting them off their balance 
 by his rhetoric, sweep them away upon a 
 whirlwind of words words that stirred the 
 blood and set the pulses beating, words that 
 rang like the stroke of steel spurs on marble, 
 words that could cut like a whip-lash on a 
 winter's day, words that spared neither the 
 living nor the dead, age or sex. 
 
 He had won more important criminal cases 
 than any man who had ever practised in 
 California, and had lifted many men from the 
 very shadow of death, and set them free. 
 
 Apart from his profession he was nothing 
 merely nothing. Politics, sport, society, 
 money - making none of these things had 
 allurements for him. He was simply Lefroy, 
 the criminal advocate the greatest actor- 
 orator in the pulsing drama of crime.
 
 THE HAUNTED MAN 171 
 
 Had he turned his attention to politics he 
 might have become President, for there was 
 that about him which magnetised men. Folks 
 called him Lefroy the " spell - binder," but 
 nothing could tempt him away from his 
 profession. 
 
 When not engaged on either side, which 
 was rare, he would go to the court and watch 
 a great case, just as habitual theatre-goers 
 watch a drama. He would sit with his eyes 
 half-closed, coldly impassive, and listen to the 
 attack and defence. Such things made up 
 his life. 
 
 He had no wife, he made no friends. 
 People who professed to know something of 
 his antecedents said that he had arrived in 
 California when a mere boy with an elder 
 sister who had been a mother to him, until 
 she married a mining adventurer and went 
 with him into the wilds of Arizona to share 
 his fortunes and vicissitudes. 
 
 He had been bitterly opposed to that 
 marriage, considering in his hot, youthful 
 way that the man was not good enough for 
 the loving, patient, womanly sister who had 
 filled his mother's place ever since the grave 
 closed over her. 
 
 He was wrong. The man his sister married 
 was worthy of any woman ; for though rough 
 in appearance and rugged in speech he was
 
 172 MAROZIA 
 
 a straight man in all his dealings. Lefroy 
 was to learn in later life that when you get 
 a straight mining man you get the squarest 
 kind of human being that breathes, though 
 straight mining men are rare. 
 
 Bitter words passed between the lad and 
 his sister, and between that sister's husband 
 and himself. The wedded pair went away 
 into the wilderness, and one child, a girl, was 
 born to them. 
 
 Then calamity fell heavily and suddenly 
 upon the little family. The mining camp in 
 which they had taken up their abode was raided 
 by Indians, who had broken from the reserva- 
 tion, and both the mother and the father 
 were killed. The child escaped, and was 
 adopted by a childless couple of pioneers, and 
 for many years she remained with them as 
 their child ; but at last she left them, to make 
 her way into the big towns and cities of the 
 West, for her blood was calling her and she 
 had to go. It was the blood of a breed of 
 actors and actresses, and the strain was rich 
 in her. 
 
 She was like her mother's brother, the great 
 advocate the drama .was part of her nature, 
 just as sea spume is part of the ocean. 
 
 The actress knew that the advocate was 
 her uncle. He did not know the actress was 
 his niece, because she had used the name of
 
 THE HAUNTED MAN 173 
 
 her adopted parents when she went on the 
 stage, and never made herself known to the 
 man who in his hot youth had flouted her 
 father and upbraided her mother. 
 
 Now she lay dead, killed in a fit of insane 
 jealousy by the prisoner in the dock, a young 
 cattle-ranch owner, who had been bewitched 
 by her genius and her beauty. 
 
 The woman-slayer had engaged Lefroy to 
 defend him, not knowing that the advocate 
 was the only blood relation the dead woman 
 had in the State. 
 
 Lefroy had accepted the task, being unaware 
 that the dead actress was his much -loved 
 sister's child ; but during the conduct of the 
 case the knowledge had come to Lefroy. 
 
 At first it stunned him. The marvel of 
 the thing, the irony of it, that he should have 
 been selected to save the life of the man who 
 had done his kinswoman to death. At first 
 he felt his gorge rise against the prisoner, 
 and he determined then and there to throw 
 up his brief, and let some lesser man defend 
 the woman-slayer. 
 
 But the situation grew upon him, the intense 
 dramatic force of all the surroundings touched 
 the dominant note in his nature. Just as 
 The Bells appealed to Henry Irving, so this 
 living thing appealed to him. He would be 
 true to his profession, true to his client, though
 
 174 MAROZIA 
 
 that client's hands were red and dripping with 
 his kinswoman's blood. 
 
 He had always believed that if a great 
 occasion arose, he could rise above the common 
 tide of human feeling, and stand a thing apart 
 from his fellows. The occasion had come. 
 He determined to rise with the tide and sink 
 his individuality. 
 
 When he stood up to plead for the prisoner 
 his clean-shaven face was pallid, his eyes blood- 
 shot, his lips tremulous, his voice low and 
 intense. 
 
 His colleagues expected him to point the 
 finger of scorn at the name of the dead woman. 
 They thought that his only hope of saving 
 his client from the electric chair lay in smirch- 
 ing the fair fame of the victim. 
 
 They whispered amongst themselves that 
 he would be compelled to make her seem a 
 woman who had trodden with careless feet 
 along the primrose paths of love and dalliance, 
 in order to awaken sympathy for the man 
 who stood with clenched hands and square 
 jaws in the dock. 
 
 "Lefroy has done many wonderful things 
 with juries," whispered a greybeard, who was 
 himself great in the law ; " but," he added, 
 " this is the hardest case he has ever had. The 
 evidence is clear against his client ; I can see 
 a loophole nowhere."
 
 THE HAUNTED MAN 175 
 
 The jury was hanging on the advocate's 
 words. Now and again one of them turned 
 to gaze at the prisoner, just a fleeting gaze, and 
 each time this happened Lefroy seemed to 
 concentrate all his forces of mind and will 
 upon the jury, until he drew the eyes to 
 himself, drew them and held them, until 
 every man was craning forward to catch his 
 utterances. 
 
 He did not cast one stone at the dead ; 
 instead of that, he took the jury away from 
 the crowded, stifling court-house, where they 
 could hear the hum of a city's traffic, and 
 the murmur of the great Pacific beating on 
 the beach ; took them on the wings of 
 fancy, by virtue of the orator's gift that was 
 in him, to that wild Arizona camp, and made 
 them hear the yells of the redskins as they 
 brandished scalping - knife and tomahawk, 
 made them hear the whip-like crack of the 
 pioneer's rifle, and above it all the wailing 
 of a baby voice. 
 
 He made them follow that baby girl step 
 by step from childhood to girlhood, from girl- 
 hood to womanhood, and all along the highway 
 of her life he scattered flowers of praise. He 
 took them on to the stage with her, and made 
 them see her splendid triumphs ; he took 
 them behind the scenes, and laid bare the 
 temptations that had been set to snare
 
 176 MAROZIA 
 
 her feet, and he crowned her queen of chastity 
 and purity, a genius lifting herself from the 
 sloughs of poverty to her own place amongst 
 the great, unaided, and unsoiled. 
 
 Men clenched their teeth as they listened, 
 and eyes that were hard as steel in the battle 
 of life grew humid with hard-held tears. 
 
 Lefroy himself was like a being trans- 
 figured. His beautiful voice rose and fell, 
 now pulsating with admiration, now quivering 
 with unspeakable pain as he crowned the dead 
 with flowers. 
 
 Then came a dramatic pause, a stillness in 
 which men felt their own heart-beats, as Lefroy 
 faced round and looked at the prisoner. 
 
 He was leaning on the rail, his hands locked 
 together as though the knuckles would burst 
 through flesh and skin ; his underjaw pro- 
 truding, his eyes fixed on the advocate in a 
 wild, almost maniac stare, the sweat trickling 
 in great beads down his face. He knew now 
 who his advocate was, knew that this must be 
 the man the dead actress had spoken of so 
 often, as the pitiless relative who was too 
 proud to own her. 
 
 A babble of incoherent words burst in a 
 furious torrent from his lips, for he thought 
 that his advocate had thrown him over, and 
 many in that packed court-room besides the 
 prisoner thought so also, for the eulogy on
 
 THE HAUNTED MAN 177 
 
 the murdered woman had been wonderfully 
 complete and powerful. 
 
 No one who looked at the prisoner as he 
 leaned forward from the dock, babbling in 
 impotent wrath at his advocate, could have 
 believed that he was acting a part. The 
 whites of his eyes were blood-shot, a little 
 trickle of foam escaped from the corners of 
 his mouth. Lefroy had studied his tempera- 
 ment, and had wound him up to the maniac 
 point. No actor that ever lived could have 
 played the madman's part as that man in the 
 dock played it, for he was mad for the time 
 being. Mad to think that he had baited the 
 trap that appeared to lead him to death. 
 
 Long and pitifully Lefroy gazed at the 
 mouthing wretch. The advocate was acting 
 then, acting with all the consummate art of 
 which he was a master, and the magnetised 
 jury saw the prisoner through the advocate's 
 eyes rather than through their own. 
 
 When he turned to the jury he touched 
 their pity with deft fingers, playing with their 
 heart-strings. He spoke of brain-storms that 
 swept a man's reason from its balance as 
 cyclones sweep the Pacific, leaving desolation 
 and ruin in their wake. 
 
 He asked what reason this man who jibbered 
 upon them from the dock had for the crime. 
 The woman was pure, the man had loved her, 
 
 M
 
 s 
 178 MAROZIA 
 
 and she had loved him; but she loved art, 
 dramatic art, better than she loved her lover ; 
 she would not leave the stage and forego her 
 triumphs. Then came the brain-storm, and 
 the tragedy born of momentary madness, 
 which brings us face to face with the present 
 and what a present ! a dead woman mourned 
 by a nation and that 
 
 With towering figure and outstretched hand, 
 Lefroy pointed to the assassin, who, frantic 
 with rage, struggled to leap from the dock to 
 attack him, and was only held back by two 
 burly warders. 
 
 When the jury left the court that had 
 recorded a verdict of " Temporarily Insane," 
 the prisoner went into durance. 
 
 The advocate went home. Men thought 
 of his triumph, and wondered. He thought 
 of the dead woman, and said nothing. 
 
 Fifteen months passed, and the insanity 
 experts of the prison declared the prisoner 
 sane again. He was sane enough to sign 
 large cheques, and he was free. He had 
 even learned to solace himself with the 
 thought that he was not a murderer ; 'he 
 was the victim of a brain-storm. 
 
 As he stepped into a coupd at the prison 
 gates, Lefroy, who had been waiting, stepped 
 in beside him, but did not speak a word.
 
 THE HAUNTED MAN 179 
 
 After a while the ex-prisoner, unable to bear 
 the strain of that silent presence, sprang out 
 of the coupe. 
 
 Lefroy did the same, and followed him. 
 He never spoke, never gave him a peg to 
 hang a quarrel upon. He slept at the same 
 hotels, dined at the same table, travelled in the 
 same cars. He was getting on his enemy's 
 nerves with a grim persistency that proved his 
 knowledge of human nature. The haunted 
 man fled to Los Angeles. Lefroy went with 
 him like a shadow, never uttering a word, 
 but his eyes those all-compelling eyes that 
 had magnetised the jury seemed eternally 
 on the face of the woman-slayer. 
 
 When he looked up from his plate at meals 
 he met those eyes, so strangely like the eyes 
 of the actress he had done to death. When 
 he fled to his room at night the last thing 
 he saw was the silent, accusing face in the 
 corridor. When he came down in the morning 
 that face was always waiting for him, either 
 on the stairs or on the landing. 
 
 Lefroy was driving him desperate. He 
 bolted back to San Francisco. Lefroy 
 chartered a special train, and was waiting 
 for him on the platform when he arrived. 
 
 He caught sight of the pale, clean-shaven 
 face, and half-turned as if to flee. Then he 
 had another "brain-storm," the last he ever
 
 180 MAROZIA 
 
 had ; his hand went to his hip - pocket for 
 his pistol; but Lefroy had not studied his 
 man for nothing. 
 
 The two pistols spoke at once ; but one was 
 fired by a frightened, goaded man, the other 
 by a human icicle. 
 
 " Good job you were quick on the trigger, 
 Mr Lefroy," said a railway detective, who 
 had seen (as he thought) the whole episode. 
 "The beggar was as rabid as a mad dog. 
 Close thing for you ; his bullet took away 
 the flower from your buttonhole, but you 
 got him good and sure. He's down and 
 out I " 
 
 Then Lefroy went and put a wreath on the 
 grave of his sister's child.
 
 XIII 
 FROM THE BURIED PAST 
 
 LIKE most of the fishing villages on the 
 French coast La Guippire was very old, and 
 most of its inhabitants could trace their 
 descent from father to son, through many 
 generations of fisher-folk, who had lived and 
 died peacefully enough within its precincts. 
 
 It is true, that long ago in the days when 
 smuggling was a profitable occupation, some 
 of the men of La Guippire had ventured to 
 run illicit cargoes to the English coast ; but 
 those days were dead, and one only heard 
 of such things from the lips of old gossips, 
 who would prate of those adventurous times 
 over a cup of wine, on such rare occasions 
 as the advent of a stranger within the gates 
 of La Guippire. 
 
 Nothing had ever happened to materially 
 alter the course of events in this little old- 
 world, out - of - the - way corner of creation. 
 Even the great revolution that had stirred 
 the pulse of humanity in nearly every land 
 
 183
 
 184 MAROZIA 
 
 had failed to stir the calm of these fisher- 
 folk, who lived year in year out a hard, 
 laborious existence, forcing the surly ocean 
 to yield a hand-to-mouth livelihood to them, 
 and to their wives and families. 
 
 Many years after the death of the great 
 Napoleon in exile, an English fishing-smack 
 landed a party of three at La Guippire. One 
 was an old man with a thin, crabbed face, 
 and the manner of an autocrat. He was 
 gaunt and poverty - stricken, yet he spoke 
 and acted like one who had ruled in high 
 places. Long years of exile in England had 
 not toned his arrogance, or lowered his pride. 
 His fierce, old eyes flashed from under bony 
 brows like the eyes of a hawk just unhooded, 
 and at the least sign of irritation his high, 
 thin nose would quiver like the nose of a 
 hound about to spring. His clothes were 
 nearly threadbare, yet they were of a cut and 
 material that spoke dumbly of courts and 
 courtly company. His hands were long and 
 thin and shapely. No man who had ever 
 toiled for a living could grow old, and yet 
 show such hands as those. 
 
 Poor as a rat he might be, and yet there 
 was that about him which made the fisher- 
 folk shrink back and give him the wall, when 
 they met him in the village. 
 
 His hair, which was white as snow, he wore
 
 FROM THE BURIED PAST 185 
 
 long, gathered at the back in a queue, and 
 tied by a piece of faded black ribbon. Even 
 his eyebrows were white and bristly, as though 
 the frost from the island that had given him 
 a refuge so long had touched them. The 
 eyes beneath were coal-black and piercing. 
 
 He looked what he was, poor as a rat, proud 
 as a prince, a fierce, vindictive, unbending, 
 unrelenting old aristocrat. Of the two com- 
 panions of this strange old man, one was a 
 tiny tot of a girl, the other a boy of ten, who 
 halted as he walked, for one leg was shorter 
 than the other. The girl child looked the 
 picture of health and beauty. The boy had 
 a thin, weird kind of figure, and a pinched, 
 starved face only his eyes were magnetic. 
 The two little creatures were the grand- 
 children of the white-haired old thoroughbred. 
 He had brought them back with him to a 
 land that had drunk the blood of nearly all 
 their kinsfolk. He had seen his wife kneel 
 at the guillotine, had seen the head he had 
 fondled and caressed fall into the hateful 
 basket. Perhaps that was why his old eyes 
 were so terribly fierce, even yet. When age 
 hardens hate, it is steel-edged and pitiless. 
 
 The English fishing-smack had put ashore 
 a few trucks, and one big, iron-clasped chest, 
 when the three wayfarers were landed. Then 
 the rough sea-dogs had taken themselves off
 
 186 MAROZIA 
 
 without satisfying the curiosity of the knot 
 of fisher-folk who had questioned them. 
 
 There was a good reason why they had 
 said nothing about their passengers they 
 had nothing to say. Curtly the old exile 
 had asked the way to the cure's house, and 
 curtly he had thanked his informant. Then, 
 leaving his belongings on the beach, he had 
 taken the girl in his arms and marched off, 
 the lame boy limping painfully beside him. 
 
 What took place between the cure and the 
 returned wanderer no man ever knew, but a 
 few hours afterwards all the village learned 
 that the people who had come to them from 
 the lap of the sea had gone to live .in the 
 tumble - down remnant of a farmhouse that 
 overlooked the bay. 
 
 It had been empty for many years that 
 farmhouse, and people had wondered why no 
 owner had come to look after it. They knew 
 that it had formed part of the possessions of 
 a family that people had said had died out 
 long ago. Now the owner had come into 
 his own, and the simple folk wondered more 
 than they had ever done before. 
 
 As the days went by it became known that 
 the wanderers had settled down permanently 
 at La Guippire. As soon as the domestic 
 arrangements were made, the white-haired 
 man had unlocked the big iron- clasped chest,
 
 187 
 
 and had taken from its inside two long, thin 
 blades. One of these he had handed to the 
 cripple boy, the other he took in his own 
 shrivelled, claw-like hand, and had commenced 
 to teach the child the use of the weapon. 
 And the little fellow, who seemed to take but 
 slight interest in any other thing in life, would 
 fix those strange, magnetic eyes of his first 
 on the cold, blue steel, then upon the black, 
 blazing eyes of his grandsire. 
 
 It was an uncanny sight to watch those 
 two with the steel between them ; one on the 
 threshold of life, one far gone towards the 
 grave. When the child grew tired the grand- 
 sire would bid him be seated, and then, rolling 
 back the sleeve from his skinny, right arm, he 
 would fight with an imaginary enemy, bidding 
 the child watch his every movement. At 
 intervals he would pause and explain this or 
 that movement to his pupil. 
 
 At one time it would be this way : " Now, 
 little one, give all your attention ! " He 
 would make a few marvellously rapid thrusts, 
 now high, now low, now inside, now outside 
 the guard. 
 
 " So ! " he would explain, " that is how 
 St Just, who was one of the best blades in 
 France, would attack, and his attack was 
 fatal unless you knew and understood his 
 method. Now watch whilst I show you the
 
 188 MAROZIA 
 
 method of the man who killed St Just the 
 Sieur de Moray." 
 
 He would crouch until his body was 
 almost bent double ; retreating, always retreat- 
 ing, with his sword-arm crooked until it was 
 not more than half its length. Then suddenly, 
 even as he retreated, he would leap nimbly 
 to one side, straighten his body, and thrust 
 down, as if going over a tall man's guard. 
 "That was how he killed St Just. I saw 
 him do it. It was a pretty sight, grand- 
 child ! " 
 
 And the boy would nod his head gravely 
 and approvingly, as if he fully appreciated 
 the subtlety of the manoeuvre. 
 
 "Which style do you like best?" the old 
 warlock would enquire, and the boy would 
 answer gravely : " Both are good ; different 
 styles for different men you fight with. St 
 Just's style for one enemy, De Moray's style 
 for another. The thing is to make up your 
 mind quickly which fashion to adopt when 
 the man you have to fight is in front of 
 you." 
 
 " Good good 1 " the old man would cry ; 
 then he would take the boyish face in his 
 hands and look at him long and earnestly. 
 At such times he would cry : " I was the 
 best swordsman of my day in France, but 
 my father your great grandfather was the
 
 FROM THE BURIED PAST 189 
 
 best blade in all Europe. You have his eyes. 
 You are lame, but with those eyes you will 
 not mind lameness." 
 
 And the boy would nod again gravely and 
 say : " No ; I shall not mind lameness when 
 the man I have to fight is in front of me." 
 
 After the lesson, which always lasted for 
 hours every day, rain or shine, the old exile 
 would sit in front of the boy and tell him 
 the story round which his life was to revolve. 
 
 " It was my friend, Gaston Fauergnac, who 
 betrayed our party ; it was he who sold us 
 to the butchers ; it was he who gave the 
 red Republican wolves the list of aristocrats 
 remaining in France, with the description of 
 
 their hiding-places ; it was he he he " 
 
 The old man would rise with nose, mouth, 
 and white eyebrows all working madly. " It 
 was he who sent your grandmother, my 
 beloved and honoured wife, to the guillotine. 
 I was never able to meet him ; he is dead. 
 I may never meet his son, but if I do not, 
 and if you do, you must make him fight, 
 and kill him." 
 
 The boy, sitting very still in his favourite 
 attitude, one knee nursed by his clasped 
 hands, would nod and say: "Yes, yes, I 
 shall kill him." 
 
 " If his son escapes you, and you meet his 
 grandson, you will kill him."
 
 190 MAROZIA 
 
 " I will not leave one of the House of 
 Fauergnac alive in France," the boy would 
 answer. 
 
 The old man would press the blue steel 
 to the youngster's lips. The boy would kiss 
 it, and the day's lesson would end. That 
 was his everyday lesson until his grandfather 
 died, and he was eighteen years old. 
 
 The good cur6 had taught him as well as 
 he was able all the other things that a lad of 
 breeding should know, and so he had grown 
 from childhood to young manhood in loneli- 
 ness and poverty, with hate of the destroyer 
 of his house instilled into him every day, 
 aye, almost every hour of his life. He had 
 but one dream, one ambition to meet the 
 representative of the House of Fauergnac and 
 kill him. 
 
 His sister, growing up beside him, had 
 even a more lonely life than the cripple boy, 
 for she had nothing to live for nothing to 
 look forward to. She could not play with 
 the fisher lasses, for her grandfather would 
 have considered such a thing a degradation. 
 Poor she might be, but in her veins ran the 
 blood of the old nobility of France, the 
 proudest blood in Europe. 
 
 When the old man's hour for passing had 
 come, he had called the boy to his bedside 
 and said : " You will not forget ? Whenever
 
 FROM THE BURIED PAST 191 
 
 or wherever you meet a Fauergnac you will 
 think of the day when the guillotine did its 
 work on the Flower of France?" 
 
 And the boy, fixing those strange eyes of 
 his on the eyes of the other had answered 
 simply : " I will not forget." 
 
 Then the old man had turned his face to 
 the wall and had died without further sign. 
 
 Then the curd came and told the young 
 man that every year he would receive a small 
 sum of money, just a pittance, that would 
 enable him and his sister to live as they 
 had always lived. 
 
 " Where does the money come from ? " he 
 had asked ; but the cure refused to say. 
 
 "Your grandfather was content to receive 
 the money year by year, so must you be 
 content, and without question." 
 
 "Have I a right to it, or is it charity?" 
 
 " You have a right," was the cure's answer, 
 and no more was said. 
 
 After the funeral the young man used to 
 fence daily with his sister. She was very 
 clever, very quick, and her education had 
 been almost as complete as his own. 
 
 A year passed, and great changes were 
 talked of for La Guippire. The little fishing 
 village was to be turned into a French naval 
 base. Officers in uniform came down and 
 measured off spaces fronting the bay, artisans
 
 192 MAROZIA 
 
 came in flocks and began to erect buildings, 
 engineers and surveyors were constantly at 
 work. 
 
 The village was transformed. On the main 
 sea-front an esplanade was created, cafe's 
 sprang up with magical swiftness, and amidst 
 the turmoil and bustle of the new life the 
 simple fisher-folk found themselves elbowed 
 out of the way. They belonged to the past. 
 
 The lame young man in the shabby clothes 
 who lived in the tumble - down farmhouse 
 constantly limped down and walked silently 
 amongst the new arrivals. He made no 
 friends, but he was gravely courteous to all 
 who addressed him, and his stiff, unbending 
 manner caused much comment, especially 
 amongst the military and naval officers, who 
 saw in him something that awoke echoes of 
 the past. 
 
 His sister sometimes went with him on 
 his explorations but not often. She was too 
 beautiful and too shabby, too proud and too 
 poor to care to go where others could notice her. 
 
 One day, however, a slight accident to the 
 girl brought a man to the rescue, a big, burly 
 man, who was the first military engineer of his 
 day. He begged to be allowed to drive the 
 brother and sister home, and the lame young 
 man consented. 
 
 That was but the beginning. Many visits
 
 FROM THE BURIED PAST 193 
 
 followed, until, in the end, the engineer, who 
 had no one to consult but himself, asked the 
 girl to be his wife. She referred him to her 
 brother as the head of the family, and the 
 cripple freely and frankly gave his sanction. 
 
 The next evening the three dined together 
 at the leading caf, and the great engineer 
 gaily introduced his fiance to his friends. 
 
 It was getting late when two men entered 
 the cafe arm-in-arm. They were dressed in 
 the uniform of a regiment of artillery. One 
 was a colonel, the other a lieutenant. 
 
 The moment the eyes of the cripple fell 
 upon the face of the colonel his mouth began 
 to twitch. He drew from an inner pocket a 
 miniature painted on ivory, and studied it 
 closely, raising his eyes every now and again 
 to the face of the man opposite. 
 
 Folks smiled. They had seen him do that 
 many times during the past few months, but 
 they had never seen his face with such a 
 look upon it as it wore now. 
 
 Turning to his sister's fiancee, who had been 
 watching him with an amused smile, the 
 cripple said : " Who are those two gentle- 
 men ? " 
 
 " Colonel and Lieutenant Fauergnac, of 
 the Artillery. Shall I introduce you?" 
 
 " Please yes." 
 
 The introduction was made, and the cripple 
 
 N
 
 194 MAROZIA 
 
 chatted for nearly an hour with his new 
 friends. Then he limped over to his sister and 
 whispered : "It has come at last. Those two 
 men are the last of the House of Fauergnac. 
 I have it from their own lips." 
 
 The girl grasped his hand. " You you 
 will you do it ? " 
 
 His voice was low and fierce. " Yes." 
 
 He borrowed his sister's fiance's carriage, 
 and drove home. Going to the iron-clasped 
 chest he drew out an old-world suit of clothes, 
 such clothes as the men of his family wore 
 when Louis was King, and when he had 
 dressed he took the two swords, his father's 
 and his grandfather's, under his arm, and 
 went again to the caf. 
 
 As he entered the place he saw that every- 
 one was sitting very much as when he left. 
 He limped painfully and slowly amidst the 
 little round tables, a quaint, old-world figure 
 in that dress of a bygone day. 
 
 The people ceased drinking and talking, 
 and looked at him wonderingly. No one 
 laughed; his face was too solemn and too 
 tense to arouse mirth. 
 
 Laying the swords on his sister's lap he 
 limped over to the two Fauergnacs and said 
 something in a low voice to the elder one. 
 The man leant back in his chair and laughed 
 noisily. The cripple slowly drew off one of
 
 FROM THE BURIED PAST 195 
 
 his old faded gloves and struck him across 
 the mouth. 
 
 Out in the yellow moonlight, the elder 
 Fauergnac, the one who had laughed noisily, 
 was lying on the grass. His son, the 
 lieutenant, was kneeling beside him, trying 
 to staunch the blood that flowed in a pink 
 stream down his chest. The cripple stood 
 a few paces away, his sword bent in both 
 hands, waiting. 
 
 The dying man whispered : " Don't fight 
 with him, Louis. He is a demon. I know 
 the history of his race.' 
 
 " I will fight him, father." 
 
 " No, no, Louis, you are the last of our 
 race he will kill you you." 
 
 And he did.
 
 XIV 
 
 A HUNTER OF LIONS AND A 
 GIVER OF KISSES
 
 XIV 
 
 A HUNTER OF LIONS AND A 
 GIVER OF KISSES 
 
 THE farmhouse, built of unhewn rocks gathered 
 by Kaffir slaves in the ravine below, perched 
 like an uneasy bird on the precipitous slope 
 of the kopje. There was little about the 
 dwelling to single it out from thousands of 
 others that lie scattered over Nature's dimpled 
 breast in the interior of South Africa, it was 
 long and low, and rude, without one solitary 
 redeeming trait in the shape of architectural 
 ornament. A strong, stout shelter for man 
 and maid nothing more. 
 
 Above it the kopje rose almost perpen- 
 dicularly, until the frowning black rocks on 
 its crest felt the soft caresses of the snow-white 
 clouds that floated in the dazzling blue sky. 
 Below, the kopje sloped into a ravine where 
 a narrow streamlet, like a silver streak, bubbled 
 and foamed amidst rocks and reeds, beyond 
 the little watercourse a couple of hundred 
 
 199
 
 200 MAROZIA 
 
 yards of grass land lay, on which the scanty 
 flocks and herds luxuriated in the rich veldt 
 herbage. Then, just where the sunlight and 
 the shadows met, another line of kopjes rose, 
 making a framework for the little home, so 
 ruggedly grand, so austerely great that the 
 farmhouse lost its uncouthness and became 
 a cradle for heroes, a nursery for freemen. 
 
 In that rude dwelling Paul Kotze had lived 
 for five years. He had trekked there a single 
 man, and found no living soul within three 
 days' ride of the spot. His strong hands had 
 erected the homestead stone by stone. His 
 was the stout heart that had faced Nature's 
 inhospitable welcome. He and his servants 
 had built the stone fence round the little 
 pasture ground. His hands had sown the 
 seeds for the yearly crops of maize, and wheat, 
 and oats. His judgment had selected the 
 mares to breed from, so that his farm might 
 become celebrated for the colts and fillies to 
 be sold year by year. The sheep and the 
 goats and cows came later, when he married 
 the blue - eyed, fair - faced, white - souled 
 Katrina Waal. 
 
 Paul was thirty when he married, and 
 Katrina was only sixteen. He was strong 
 and tall, browned and bearded, with just a 
 suspicion of wildness in his past which made 
 the old dames shake their heads ; but the old
 
 men said : " Let be with your chatter ; " when 
 the old women grew prophetic in their scandal- 
 mongering, " Let be with your gossip, women." 
 
 Paul was a mighty hunter from his boy- 
 hood, and a good fighter when the Basutos 
 tried to sweep the country, and if he was 
 fond of a pretty face, small blame to the lad 
 all great hunters and fighters are ; then the old 
 greyheads chuckled in their beards, and told 
 tales to one another concerning their own deeds 
 in youth's hot days, wherein they figured largely 
 as heroes in adventures of love, and hunting, 
 and war. For no young man has yet met 
 an old man who was not a bit of a rip and 
 a bit of a hero in his sunny youth if one is 
 to believe the old men's tales. 
 
 Katrina had nothing to recommend her but 
 her bonny face, she looked one square in the 
 eyes (a rare gift with a woman) when she 
 talked, and she knew a knave as a dog knows 
 a tramp. Her figure was guiltless of corsets, 
 yet, when she had given Paul their first and 
 only son, it would have puzzled Worth, 
 and all his Parisian staff, to have improved 
 her figure. Her bust arched outwards below 
 the shoulders, and inwards towards the waist, 
 as a mother's should who wishes to give the 
 world a race of strong men. She moved about 
 her daily duties with a free, swinging stride, 
 lithe, graceful, and extremely feminine, a fit
 
 202 MAROZIA 
 
 mate for one who had been both a mighty 
 hunter and a lover of women. Passion was 
 written in the full, rich, red lips, in the glance 
 of the proud blue eyes, in the warm clasp of 
 the strong shapely hands, in the carmine blood 
 that swept so readily along neck and cheek ; 
 in the very spring of her strong, young body 
 as she played with the child in the twilight, or 
 held the bridle of the colt which Paul intended 
 to back and break before selling. But it was 
 the passion which belongs of right (the right 
 of nature) to the wife, not the passion of the 
 wanton. 
 
 The strong womanly chin, the bold, broad 
 forehead, the slightly knitted brows, the 
 fearlessness of her gaze were God's plainly 
 written warnings to the libertine, to the 
 devotee at the shrine of lust " to stand off the 
 grass" where Katrina Kotze was concerned. 
 Such a woman could snatch her husband's 
 rifle from the wall and defend her honour, 
 saving the last cartridge for herself, but she 
 could never yield to any man's blandishments, 
 no matter how strong the current of her blood 
 might run ; and believe me, there are many 
 such women on God's green earth, more 
 women than men, my masters. 
 
 Peace had settled upon that home, not the 
 passionless peace of the mated dove, but 
 rather the peace of the crested hawk, strong
 
 HUNTER OF LIONS GIVER OF KISSES 203 
 
 in its love, and in the eternal fitness of 
 mating. 
 
 Sometimes in between the seasons, when 
 the time lay heavy on his hands, Paul longed 
 for the crack of his rifle and the mad moments 
 which intervene between the lifting of the 
 loaded weapon to the steady shoulder, and 
 the roar and spring of the wounded beast. 
 He longed for those moments with all an 
 old lion hunter's ceaseless craving; but he 
 never longed for those other bygone joys : 
 for the whispered word by the cactus hedge, 
 for the stealthy clasp of a warm small hand ; 
 for the clinging touch of moist red lips hard 
 pressed to his bearded mouth ; and Katrina, 
 she knew and understood. Had she been a 
 man, she would have been as Paul had been 
 in his youth, a hunter of lions and a giver 
 of kisses. So when in his sleep he sometimes 
 murmured the names of Johannah or Gussie, 
 she only cuddled him closer, and kissed the 
 names from his mouth as an angel might 
 wipe some dark blot from the soul of a 
 sinner. 
 
 When the war came, and the Briton 
 measured his strength with the Boer, Kotze 
 took his rifle from the wall, determined to live 
 or die side by side with the men of his own 
 blood. They might be right or they might 
 be wrong, but right or wrong, Paul felt in
 
 204 MAROZIA 
 
 his soul that his place was with them, and it 
 was Katrina who tightened his saddle girths 
 when the nigger servant, Martinas, brought 
 Paul's favourite horse to the door on the 
 morning of farewell. 
 
 Her eyes were heavy with unshed tears, 
 but her hand never trembled when she 
 gripped the straps and laced the girths tight. 
 Her hands never trembled when she lifted 
 the little one up to kiss him farewell. But 
 when he had gone, she locked herself up in 
 her bedroom and had a good cry, as is the 
 way with such women. But she ran the farm 
 all the same, saw to the crops, to the mend- 
 ing of fences, to the milking and calving of 
 cows ; looked to the making of butter, the 
 breeding of colts, and the making of bacon 
 just as if Paul had been home ; and the Kaffirs 
 knew better than to try and loiter over their 
 work. The " baas " was away at the war, but 
 the " tante " had eyes and ears and hands 
 for them both, and the lazy ones knew it. 
 
 One day Paul Kotze came back to see his 
 loved ones. He was thinner, sterner, more 
 self-contained than when he had left, for he 
 had been amidst wild scenes of slaughter. He 
 had seen comrades he had known from boy- 
 hood fall shattered by shot and shell, but 
 undaunted in their pluck, dying for a lost 
 cause, but dying as only brave men can die,
 
 HUNTER OF LIONS GIVER OF KISSES 205 
 
 yielding up their lives to enrich the pages of 
 
 history. 
 
 He made no vows to Katrina as he sat that 
 one night, his last night by his own hearth, 
 but she knew that when his country needed 
 him Paul would not be found wanting, and 
 she would not have had it otherwise, dearly 
 as she loved him. Better it seemed to her 
 that his little son should have no father, than 
 that other children should point the finger of 
 scorn at him and call him " a coward's son." 
 
 It was the morning after the home-coming, 
 and Paul was smoking by his kitchen table, 
 Katrina was making bread, and the little one 
 was playing on the floor between them, when 
 up the ravine came the clatter of horses' hoofs. 
 
 Paul sprang to his feet and gripped his rifle, 
 Katrina threw up her head as a stag lifts his 
 antlers at the first baying of the hounds. 
 A Kaffir wench leapt breathlessly into the 
 room. " The Rooibaatjes are coming, baas ; 
 they are almost here." She was breathless 
 with running, for the British scouts had come 
 suddenly and rapidly. There were a dozen 
 of them, and the man who rode at their head 
 had an evil face, a cruel face, a face that men 
 had learnt to fear in battle, and no woman 
 trusted in peace ; and at his side rode a fair- 
 faced boy officer of the Inniskilling Dragoons. 
 A fair-faced boy with the chivalry of a great
 
 206 MAROZIA 
 
 nation printed by the Master Painter's hand 
 in every lineament of his Saxon features. 
 
 Katrina had stepped to the door; one 
 glance had told her that there was no hope 
 for Paul in flight, for every scout carried his 
 rifle ready in his hand. If Paul made a dash 
 for liberty, he would be done to death before 
 her eyes, and all her woman's soul revolted 
 against the sacrifice. She turned swiftly, 
 " Paul come," with a deft touch of her hand 
 she caused a portion of the masonry near the 
 chimney to revolve, disclosing an aperture 
 large enough to hold a man. Paul looked 
 at her as if the earth had opened, for he knew 
 nothing of the hiding-place. "Quick," she 
 said, "there is no time for talk, I read in 
 an old romance of such hiding-places, and 
 whilst you were away I had this one built. 
 Quick, Paul." 
 
 The man's stubborn pride revolted, his 
 brows came down until the eyebrows met 
 between the hard set eyes, the square jaw 
 was set like steel. The woman saw and 
 understood, it was no time for words; pick- 
 ing the baby from the floor, she held him up 
 in mute reproach to the father. In a moment 
 Paul Kotze had stepped into the hiding-place, 
 the masonry revolved, and he was hidden as 
 safely as if the earth had opened to receive 
 him. He could see and hear all that occurred
 
 HUNTER OF LIONS GIVER OF KISSES 207 
 
 in the room, but he was powerless to do any- 
 thing, no matter what might go wrong, he 
 at least was helpless. He gritted his teeth 
 when he realised his position ; but he had 
 scant time for thought. 
 
 Barely had he been hidden from view, ere 
 the British scouts clattered up to the door. 
 The leader jumped from the saddle, and 
 walked unceremoniously into the house. 
 With one swift penetrating glance he took 
 in the whole scene ; the negro wench crouch- 
 ing against the white-washed wall, her crimson 
 headgear slightly awry ; the baby crooning 
 on the floor, and the superb looking woman 
 kneading bread by the rough plank table. 
 The gaze he fixed upon Katrina had some- 
 thing more than admiration in it, something 
 which caused the hot blood to sweep upward 
 over neck and cheek and brow ; such a glance 
 from a man to a woman was an insult more 
 deep than words, and the young Boer matron 
 felt it in all its bitterness, though her eyes 
 never for one instant flinched before his. 
 
 He bent towards her and whispered some 
 words in Dutch, a half laugh playing round 
 his mouth, a mocking devil gleaming from 
 his eyes. The woman drew herself up, until 
 she seemed to tower above the man, tall as 
 he was, then, swift as a swallow flight her 
 shapely arm flew out and her clenched hand
 
 208 MAROZIA 
 
 fell full on his mouth. So true was the blow 
 that he reeled a half pace backwards, and a 
 little stream of crimson trickled from the lips 
 driven back on the strong, white teeth. Then 
 swift as thought he stepped in, and grasping 
 the woman by both wrists, in his own iron 
 grip, he kissed her with lips that were as hot 
 as embers in hell. Paul, in his narrow prison, 
 struggled until the veins on his great neck 
 almost burst, but the masonry was thick and 
 strong, and he could only draw deep sobbing 
 breaths and gnaw his lips like a stricken tiger. 
 The child on the floor began to wail dismally ; 
 the Kaffir maid fled howling from the house, 
 and Katrina was alone with her insulter. 
 
 So they stood for just as long a space as it 
 might take a fleet runner to cover a hundred 
 paces, he flushed, exultant, with the light 
 of Hades in his dark featured face; she, 
 white as the inside feathers on a dove's 
 wing, but the light in her blue eyes was as 
 fierce as the gleam of lightning on a line of 
 bared bayonets. No word was spoken between 
 them, nothing broke the deadly stillness but 
 the wailing of the child, until an armed heel 
 rang on the stone doorstep. A man's figure 
 darkened the doorway. The figure of a man 
 tall and lithe, clad in plain khaki. 
 
 Katrina saw for one brief second, a fair, 
 boyish face, a pair of blazing steel-grey eyes.
 
 HUNTER OF LIONS GIVER OF KISSES 209 
 
 She heard a curse ripped out in finest Anglo- 
 Saxon. She heard the spurs ring on the slate 
 floor as the khaki-clad figure strode forward 
 with indescribable rapidity, she saw a strong, 
 brown hand launch out from the left shoulder, 
 and then she was free; whilst he, who a 
 moment before had held her a prisoner, lay 
 huddled up in a heap a couple of yards away, 
 with a mark on his face he would carry to 
 his grave, no matter how long the journey 
 might be. 
 
 The fair face turned to hers was terribly 
 stern. The soldier lifted his helmet from 
 his head and said : " Madam, if that hound 
 has hurt you, all England shall ring with his 
 shame ; believe me, there are few like him 
 in all our Empire." 
 
 Katrina looked at him as in all her life she 
 had looked at no other man save Paul only. 
 " There are few like you in all the world, I 
 think," she said, and her eyes were eloquent 
 as her tongue, so eloquent that the young 
 officer felt himself blushing like a girl fresh 
 from a convent. 
 
 A moment later the other fellow rose, and 
 passing out without a word swung himself 
 into the saddle, and with his men dashed off 
 at a flying gallop. Katrina stooped, lifted 
 her pretty, chubby babe in her arms, and 
 holding him towards the young soldier, said :
 
 210 MAROZIA 
 
 " Sir, I will teach him to pray for you night 
 and morning until he is a man, then he will 
 know all, and will understand ; and he will 
 pray for you on his own account for his 
 mother's sake God send you safe from the 
 wars, sir." The soldier snatched the young 
 one from her arms, kissed him on his little 
 rosebud of a mouth, lifted his helmet and 
 was gone. That day Paul Kotze rode off to 
 join his commando, and Katrina saw his face 
 no more. 
 
 A battle was raging at Colesberg; steadily 
 General French drove the stubborn Boers back 
 from stronghold to stronghold. Paul Kotze 
 had played the man that day, as he had often 
 played the part before. Always in the front 
 rank, always cool, always steady, yet so full 
 of quiet daring that even the brave men round 
 him wondered. All day long he had glanced 
 along the British lines searching for a dark, 
 savagely handsome face. He had seen the 
 man he sought, fighting like a veritable devil, 
 more than once ; but never had been able to 
 cover him with his rifle, and now it was close 
 upon evening. Suddenly a field cornet rode 
 up to the party where Paul was grouped in 
 an open space with a hundred of his comrades. 
 
 " Watch that bend at the far kopje," he said, 
 " the British Lancers are coming that way ;
 
 HUNTER OF LIONS GIVER OF KISSES 211 
 
 they mean to charge you fellows. You must 
 hold this gap no matter what happens, or we 
 are cut off from retreating ; pick your men 
 when they are within a hundred yards of you, 
 keep cool, and you can empty every saddle 
 before they can reach you. Paul Kotze, 
 the General says he leaves the officer in 
 charge of the Lancers to you." 
 
 Paul nodded, and jerking the magazine of 
 his rifle open, carefully refilled it. Ten seconds 
 later the Lancers trotted round the bend, a 
 tall, fair man rode at their head. Paul saw 
 him wave his arm, the long lances dropped 
 forward, the men stooped low in their saddles, 
 then like a thunderstorm they rolled onwards. 
 The riders plunged the spurs into their horses' 
 flanks, the war steeds laid their ears back and 
 bit savagely at each other, neighing madly as 
 they tore over the veldt with necks outstretched 
 and manes and tails flying in the wind. 
 
 Closer and closer they came, until the Boers, 
 waiting with poised rifles, could feel the earth 
 tremble with the thunder of the charge. Then 
 the rifles spoke from the ravine, men reeled in 
 their saddles, lance points dropped, riderless 
 horses dashed forward clear of the ranks. 
 Dull, yellow figures dotted the veldt behind 
 the charging ranks, cheers, mad, meaningless 
 cheers, drowned the yells of the wounded. 
 The broken ranks closed up, on came the war
 
 212 MAROZIA 
 
 dogs of England, on, like the blast of a 
 tempest, and at their head, sitting like a 
 rock in his saddle, rode the tall, fair-faced 
 boy officer ; the officer whom the Boer General 
 had given into Paul Kotze's keeping. 
 
 What had come over Paul the Lion Hunter, 
 the man of matchless coolness, had his nerve 
 failed him at that fateful moment ? He who 
 never missed his man when once his finger 
 touched the trigger. Not so. Never had 
 Paul been cooler than at that mad moment, 
 never had his nerve been more under the 
 keeping of his iron will. He had glanced 
 along his rifle barrel and picked a spot fair 
 between the grey eyes of the leader of the 
 British, but even as his finger coiled around 
 the trigger he knew the face he was about to 
 fire upon. He heard, as if a voice from the 
 heavens above had spoken the voice of his 
 wife Katrina " God bless you, sir, and send 
 you safe from the war ; " and Paul swung his 
 rifle to the right and picked off a lancer, who 
 rode half a horse length behind his leader. 
 
 On came the Lancers, the iron-shod hoofs 
 sank deep into the veldt grass. Steed neighed 
 to steed, and blew the foam from their nostrils. 
 Men yelled to men as if hell's floodgates 
 had opened. Then came the shock, the 
 lance points dipped brightly, and rose redly. 
 Roughly clad men threw up their arms and
 
 HUNTER OF LIONS GIVER OF KISSES 213 
 
 shrieked the last cry of the dying, as the 
 keen steel swept through breast -bone and 
 back-bone. Bronzed faces grew ashen white 
 in a moment, with the pallor of death. Strong, 
 rough hands gripped madly at the spear shafts, 
 as the steel rushed through lungs and heart, 
 then, as the chargers sped onward, they fell 
 with eyeballs turned skyward, with mouths 
 full of blood, hands limp and lifeless, and 
 Paul Kotze was one of those who went down 
 so sorely stricken that life with him was only 
 a matter of minutes. 
 
 So the stretcher-bearers found him with 
 just enough life in him to ask for the leader 
 of the Lancers. The fair-haired Briton bent 
 over the Boer, and heard just enough to know 
 how near he had been to death that day. 
 
 " You will save Katrine from him" gasped 
 the dying Burgher. 
 
 " I will, so help me, heaven. You know 
 him, you say." 
 
 " Know him ! False to his blood, to his 
 home, to woman, to God. Yes ; he was my 
 brother."
 
 XV 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT
 
 XV 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 
 
 IN a small town in Upper Burmah, a number 
 of men celebrated in many walks of life had 
 met to investigate certain phenomena pre- 
 sented to the scientific world by one Jarl 
 Ossgood, a Dane. They represented much 
 that was good and great in the world, those men 
 who constituted this group of investigators. 
 
 One man was an American railroad king, 
 a person of profound thought, who might 
 have been almost anything in this world, if 
 his boyhood had not been tainted by the 
 crude, bitter knowledge that direct personal 
 poverty brings with it. He had turned his 
 hand and heart to the making of money from 
 infancy, and he had succeeded, but to such a 
 man mere money was not satisfying. When 
 he became vastly rich he knew that he had 
 not won life's battle, knew that he never would 
 win it, all that he had now was a golden sword 
 with which to fight ; but the best of his life 
 lay behind him, the energy, the powers, the 
 
 217
 
 218 MAROZIA 
 
 splendid courage and resource of his youth 
 was gone for ever, burned in the cinders where 
 his golden sword was forged, yet the thirst 
 for knowledge, not the mere knowledge of the 
 schools, which any dolt who possesses a rich 
 father may attain, but the knowledge of things 
 outside the beaten track remained with him 
 in the prime of his life. 
 
 There was another man there who had 
 given all his earlier years to a toil that had 
 returned him only fruits which did not satisfy. 
 He was a soldier, a man whom Europe knew 
 as an iron- willed, ruthless man on the fields of 
 war, his name made the enemies of his country 
 tremble, for when he struck he struck with a 
 giant's force, and spared not. Yet he was un- 
 satisfied with the knowledge he possessed, and 
 longed to know what might be beyond the veil. 
 
 One other sitting there was nearly great. 
 He had written things that stretched above 
 the heads of men and turned their faces to 
 the skies, a poem that had wings, and when 
 words are winged they fly along the ages, a 
 book that laid its fingers on the heart strings 
 of the masses, but not boldly, forcefully, nobly, 
 but with uncertain strength ; it was not great, 
 but it was nearly great, the writer's inborn 
 commonness of soul had marred his master- 
 piece, yet here and there a touch of splendour 
 killed the greyness and held a world enthralled.
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 219 
 
 He had written a story too, a short story 
 that carried with it the throb of drums, the 
 scent of blood spilt in battle, the moans of 
 the wounded, the deep-drawn breaths of the 
 dying, the laughter of the victors, the anguish 
 of the vanquished, and through it all, like a 
 thread of scarlet through a woof of white, ran 
 the triumph of the Empire, but the body of 
 the story was thin, a poor, cold, clayey thing, 
 magnetised at times to glorious life but only 
 one limb at a time. His book, his poem, 
 his short story, all told the one tale. He 
 had flashes of genius that illuminated all he 
 touched ; but the body of his work belonged 
 to the earth earthy. 
 
 As for the rest of the investigators, they 
 were men who had all made a mark upon 
 the time in which they lived. One was a 
 great railway engineer, a man who laughed 
 at rivers and mountains that had defied the 
 march of progress for ages ; another was the 
 hero of this story, the " man who risked it." 
 He was famous, but he was poor, and now 
 his powers were failing him just when he 
 needed them most, for the wife he loved, the 
 brave, patient little woman who had helped 
 him fight life's battle step by step, was sinking 
 under the unending strain, his boys were grow- 
 ing to that age when their education drained 
 his scanty purse almost dry, and his hand
 
 220 MAROZIA 
 
 was losing its cunning. In a few short years 
 the world, the fickle, fleeting world, would 
 forget that he had ever existed, and the last 
 chapters of his life would be spent in misery 
 and want. He did not mind the outlook so 
 much upon his own account, as for the sake 
 of the woman who had trodden the thorny 
 path with him so uncomplainingly. 
 
 When he thought of her, his soul writhed 
 in torment, he wanted to make the end of 
 her life a dream of happiness to compensate 
 for all that she had done for him. She had 
 given up home and friends to marry him 
 when he was a poor, unknown youth, with 
 nothing to recommend him but his faith in 
 himself, and a capacity for work which few 
 men in his time could surpass. When the 
 children came, she had sacrificed the greater 
 part of her maternal joys so that she might 
 help the man she had married, though she knew 
 that all his soul was wrapped up in his fame. 
 
 But a time had come to him when he 
 saw that the plaudits of mobs, the praise of 
 learned men, the glow and the gush of critics, 
 was not worth one hour of a good wife's love, 
 or one day of the happiness that his beautiful 
 children grouped around a mother's knee could 
 give. Then he looked at his past, turning his 
 chin upon his shoulder he gazed steadily, un- 
 flinchingly along the highways of his life, and
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 221 
 
 saw the milestones standing one by one, and 
 at every milestone he saw a woman stand- 
 ing meekly, patiently, bravely, ready to dress 
 his wounded feet, and he knew that in his 
 search for fame he had been unconsciously 
 brutal, unknowingly selfish, unceasingly cruel, 
 and the knowledge brought remorse. He be- 
 came feverishly anxious to make money, to 
 store up wealth that joy might come to his 
 wife before it was too late. 
 
 She was not an old woman, not more than 
 six and thirty, tall and slender, and almost 
 girlish in her fragility. He would throw fame 
 to the dogs and toil for money. He fell at 
 the feet of the golden calf and worshipped, 
 but the cult of the calf was not for him, 
 money did not, would not come ; men called 
 him great, and fed him upon platitudes, but 
 they kept their purse-strings closed, and he 
 had come to Burmah for one of the great 
 journals, in order to earn a pittance. That 
 was how he came to be with those who 
 had gathered to hear Jarl Ossgood, the Dane, 
 tell of a mystery he had unearthed whilst 
 journeying in Thibet. 
 
 A commonplace-looking man was Jarl, the 
 Dane, a man whose rough, rugged face gave 
 few signs of the soul that lay behind the veil 
 of clay ; but the man who sat next to him 
 was moulded upon lines that the world seldom
 
 222 MAROZIA 
 
 sees. Young, black as the breast feathers of a 
 crow, great of stature, silent as the mountain- 
 tops at night, a man whose mere physical 
 gifts would have compelled attention in any 
 assembly. But it was not his length and 
 breadth of limb that held the eyes of the 
 men who sat around him, it was the majesty 
 of intellect that Nature had imprinted upon 
 his face so might Solomon have looked in 
 the heyday of his glory. 
 
 The full black eyes never wavered in the 
 steadfastness of their regard, the brow above the 
 eyes never lowered or frowned, but rested like 
 a rampart fronting an arsenal of intellectual 
 force. The great curving nose rose from be- 
 tween the eyes, and the full, delicately turned 
 nostrils betrayed courage and audacity. The 
 curving lips that hid the white, strong teeth 
 were guiltless of hair, every line was visible, an 
 intensely human face, and yet inhuman in its 
 inflexible calm. It was not a sullen face, nor 
 an austere face, simply a calm unalterable 
 living mask. 
 
 Had the soul behind that face been the soul 
 of a sensualist or a slayer of men, he would 
 have been a fiend, a devil stalking the earth, 
 limitless in evil. This was the priest whom Jarl, 
 the Dane, brought with him from Thibet, the 
 man whose mysterious powers he wished a 
 group of wise men to investigate. Long
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 223 
 
 and earnestly the Dane spoke to the little 
 assembly, telling how, during his wanderings 
 in Thibet, he had fallen in with the priest, 
 who had revealed to him things which both 
 fools and wise men had scoffed at as impossible. 
 
 " To him," said Jarl, the Dane, turning 
 with a wave of his arm towards the priest, 
 "to him there is no such thing as death or 
 annihilation, he has crossed the portals, and 
 has held communion with the world beyond, 
 and the people who inhabit it." 
 
 At this astounding statement every eye in 
 that assembly was fixed upon the black, im- 
 mutable face of the priest. 
 
 "If that is so, let him tell us what lies 
 behind the veil." It was the soldier who 
 spoke, the leader of armies, and his voice had 
 the crisp, curt ring of command in its every 
 tone. 
 
 " That he will not do," answered the Dane ; 
 "every man must see for himself, and learn 
 his own lesson. Many may make the journey, 
 if they are willing, but only a few who are 
 worthy will learn the higher secrets." 
 
 "Babes can babble like that, but we who 
 are here are not babes," retorted the soldier; 
 " we want deeds not words, proofs not 
 platitudes." 
 
 The priest rose from his resting-place, and 
 uprearing his form to its full height, until he
 
 224- MAROZIA 
 
 towered a full head over the soldier and he 
 was a man of great stature said : " Deeds ! 
 you ask for deeds, you shall have them ; 
 proofs ! you ask for proofs, you shall have 
 proofs ; you ask for a sign, I will give you a 
 sign." 
 
 His voice was like the far off echo of the 
 sea, so full, so strong, so passionless, so great, 
 and they who hearkened were awed ; no char 
 latan, no mere trickster ever spoke like that. 
 
 " You seek knowledge, the knowledge that 
 has no ending, and knowledge waits for the 
 earnest seeker ; in my hands lie the keys that 
 will open the gates of wisdom. But first let 
 me tell you the conditions. The man who 
 would know what lies beyond what men call 
 death, must first taste death. He who would 
 know what lies beyond the grave must first 
 lie in the grave. First death, then burial, 
 then the journey to the land where millions 
 upon millions abide, then the resurrection and 
 the return." 
 
 " You have passed through all this ? " asked 
 the soldier. 
 
 " I have passed through it all." 
 
 " How long does a man lie in the grave ? " 
 
 " Until the seasons have come and gone 
 twice." 
 
 "He will then return to his own with the 
 knowledge of things eternal ? "
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 225 
 
 " He will come to his own again, and his 
 knowledge will be as the knowledge of the 
 gods." 
 
 " If you would sell your knowledge you 
 might reap a harvest of gold greater than any 
 man ever possessed, priest." 
 
 " What is gold to me, soldier ? I get a cup 
 of water from the spring, a handful of corn, or 
 a cluster of grapes supplies my needs. The 
 air is free to all, the night and the day, the 
 sun and the stars are man's inheritance ; the 
 nearer we get to the gods, the further we get 
 from cities and the ways of men hid in cities." 
 
 "A man must go to the grave to gather 
 the wisdom of the gods, then, priest ? " 
 
 " There is no other way." 
 
 A silence fell upon the group of men deep, 
 solemn silence which lasted until the soldier 
 spoke again. 
 
 "Your price is too high, priest, a man 
 might learn that which would teach him that 
 his life's efforts are vanity and vexation of 
 spirit." 
 
 " A man would learn that the ambitions of 
 men count no more in the scale of creation 
 than the holes the earthworms make in the 
 clay soil by the rivers." 
 
 "Better for him if he knew that, if he 
 never returned to humankind," cried the 
 soldier passionately.
 
 826 MAROZIA 
 
 The priest looked at him with that wondrous 
 calm which nothing seemed to shake. " You 
 are wrong," he answered ; " for when men 
 have risen above personal ambition, and spent 
 their lives toiling day and night for no other 
 reward than the happiness and advancement 
 of all humankind then, and not until then, 
 will the plan of man's redemption be complete, 
 a soldier lives, dies, decays and becomes 
 dust, and ages after, a child, with a little 
 spittle upon its finger makes a plaything 
 out of what had been a conqueror's clay so 
 much for ambition but a good deed, nobly 
 done, germinates and begets deeds in its own 
 likeness a good deed never dies." 
 
 " Your price is too high, you ask too much 
 for your knowledge, priest." As he spoke the 
 soldier passed out into the night, and all the 
 rest followed him, until the priest was left 
 alone with his one disciple, Jarl, the Dane. 
 
 An hour later the American money king 
 and "the man who risked it," were closeted 
 together talking earnestly. The American 
 was speaking. 
 
 " I would take no living man's word on a 
 subject of such importance, until I had probed 
 it to the bottom. No, not the word of my 
 own brother," he said ; " and yet if ever a man 
 looked as if he could not lie, it is that priest."
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 227 
 
 " I do not believe he lies," said the other 
 man ; " I believe he spoke the truth, and yet, 
 like you, I would not accept his bare assertion ; 
 to do so would be to exercise what the fanatics 
 call faith. I prefer to exercise reason, and 
 reason demands proof." 
 
 " Is there a man living, I wonder," mused 
 the American, " who would take such a tre- 
 mendous risk as the priest demands as the 
 price of the fruit of the tree of knowledge ? 
 Have you grasped the awful significance of 
 this experiment ? If a man were to do just 
 as the priest demands, and if the priest proved 
 to be no mere charlatan, no impostor, but a 
 God-sent messenger to man, then the daring 
 mortal would be brought into contact with 
 forces which created the worlds, not this 
 planet alone, but all that exists, all the forces 
 that govern it to-day. If there is a heaven 
 he would see it, if there is a hell he would 
 behold its terrors. Think of all that it means. 
 Could a man, a mere man, gaze upon those 
 scenes and bear to live as a man again? I 
 would give much to meet such a man." 
 
 The other sat very silent thinking, thinking, 
 always thinking. He saw the woman who 
 had given up all for him, sinking to a premature 
 grave, worn out by life's bitter struggle, he 
 looked ahead a few years and saw himself, 
 beaten, broken, his back to the wall, his feet
 
 228 MAROZIA 
 
 in the mire of defeat. He saw his boys 
 growing to manhood half-educated, scornful 
 of the father who had failed, and failing, left 
 them nothing but a name, a mere empty 
 name and his soul sickened. 
 
 " You would give much, you say, to meet a 
 man who would risk this thing." 
 
 "Much." 
 
 " I will take the risk." 
 
 " You ? " The American leaned half across 
 the table in his sudden excitement, "You 
 impossible ! Why, man, the world wants you 
 as you are." 
 
 "The world may want me, but the world 
 will starve my wife, and buffet my children. 
 Listen." 
 
 Then he told his story while the money 
 king sat and drummed the table with his 
 fingers. 
 
 " So," he said at the conclusion, " I am not 
 the only one who has gone wide of the mark, 
 I hunted for money and am not satisfied, 
 though I have enough for any ten men living. 
 You hunted for fame, and having won it, find 
 it hollow ; we are like children, my friend, 
 little children seeking strayed cattle in the 
 dark ; but you are welcome to enough of my 
 wealth to satisfy your needs." 
 
 " Can I give you a share of my fame in 
 return ? "
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 229 
 
 The money king shook his head and smiled. 
 " No," he answered ; " true fame is beyond the 
 reach of dollars." 
 
 "Then as you can take nothing from me 
 for nothing, neither can I take from you with- 
 out an equivalent for that for which you have 
 wasted a life, but if you will make my wife's 
 future secure, make my boys' pathway smooth, 
 I will risk this thing of which the priest spoke, 
 and if I come back to the land of living men, 
 will tell you all that I am allowed to tell." 
 
 So the compact was made, a soul was bought 
 and sold, not for evil, but that good might come 
 of it, mortals were measuring themselves with 
 the immortal as children measure a mountain 
 with their eyes. 
 
 A little way off the edge of a beaten track 
 that led through one of the jungles of Upper 
 Burmah four men were standing around an 
 open grave. One was the Thibetan priest, the 
 man upon his left was his disciple, Jarl, the 
 Dane, on the right of the grave stood "the 
 man who risked it." 
 
 The priest spoke, and his voice sounded like 
 wind rippling through the leaves. "To-day 
 our brother dies, and is buried here in the 
 lap of the earth, the clean, brown earth 
 that purifies and cleanses all that is worth 
 cleansing, and rots all that is in itself rotten 
 and vile, when the snow on the mountain-tops
 
 30 MAROZIA 
 
 have melted twice, when the corn has ripened 
 and fallen twice before the sickle of the reaper, 
 I shall stand again beside this grave and bid 
 the sleeper awaken, and he will awake, and he 
 shall possess knowledge that few of the sons 
 of men have ever possessed ; but first he must 
 die, for death is the door to knowledge." 
 
 He passed along the grave-side and stood 
 close to the man whose loyal love for a 
 woman who was his wife, and the mother of 
 his children, made him a willing sacrifice. 
 
 " Close your eyes," he commanded. 
 
 The victim obeyed. The priest placed his 
 right hand over the man's mouth, with the 
 forefinger and thumb of his left hand he closed 
 his nostrils. 
 
 "Do not struggle," he commanded in the 
 same tone he had used before ; " obey, and 
 the anguish will be short, death comes easily, 
 life alone is hard." 
 
 The victim's fingers twitched, his eyelids 
 fluttered for a moment over straining eyeballs, 
 the veins upon his neck and forehead swelled 
 as though they would burst, his chest heaved 
 in agony, then peace came and he lay white 
 and still in the arms of the priest. If he was 
 not dead, no man ever looked more like death. 
 
 For an hour they watched beside him and 
 saw the face fall, the eyes fix in a glassy stare, 
 the hue of the cheeks settle into the cold, dirty
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 281 
 
 white pallor of death. The American drew 
 his pen-knife and cut the index finger of 
 the left hand to the bone, but no blood came 
 from the wound. Then they buried him and 
 heaped the clean, brown mould on the un- 
 coffined form and left him. The American 
 went towards the coast, and met an epidemic 
 of cholera, and four days after the burial of 
 "the man who risked it," the American was 
 thrown into an unmarked grave, a victim to 
 the greatest of all Eastern scourges. 
 
 In London, a woman surrounded by four 
 growing boys sat and mourned for her husband, 
 mourned for him as a dead man. No news 
 had reached her concerning the terrible experi- 
 ment her husband had decided to risk. He 
 had not written her, he had left the whole 
 story in the hands of the American money 
 king, who had promised to go straight to his 
 wife and tell her all, and to give the help she 
 needed ; but death had met the American and 
 closed his mouth for all time. Special corre- 
 spondents of the great dailies had traced " the 
 man who risked it " into Upper Burmah, they 
 kept upon his track until they fell in with the 
 cholera wave, then all the traces ceased, and 
 they, knowing nothing of the Thibetan priest 
 and his mission, put the disappearance of the 
 celebrity down to cholera, and he was duly
 
 282 MAROZIA 
 
 chronicled as one of its victims, and his widow, 
 who had given him of the best of her life un- 
 grudgingly, mourned for him and would not 
 be comforted. Letters came to her from many 
 of the world's great ones, deploring his loss, 
 great journals devoted much space to his un- 
 timely fate, a nation wept for him for a day 
 and left his widow and children to starve for 
 the widow was poor; and all the time he 
 slept under the soil in the Burmah jungle, 
 poverty crept into his home and dwelt there. 
 
 One by one, the little knick-knacks of happier 
 times went to the sale - rooms, the few 
 pictures he had prized, mostly gifts from 
 artists who had known and admired him ; 
 then the more solid things went, until the 
 home was bare, and the little that was left 
 was seized by the landlord for the rent. Then 
 came the dreary tramping through London 
 slums in search of cheap lodgings, and the 
 bitter battle for daily bread, and the skies 
 grew greyer and greyer. Had she been alone, 
 death would have come to her, but the mother- 
 hood within her kept her alive, she could not 
 die and leave the young things loveless and 
 homeless in the world ; she was too unselfish 
 to die. 
 
 It came to pass that in her hour of darkest 
 need she met a man, an artist, who had been
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 233 
 
 one of her husband's dearest friends, a man 
 clever but not great, his brush and his pencil 
 kept him in comfort, though not in wealth, 
 and being a manly man, he helped her 
 willingly helped her gladly until the grosser 
 souls around made light of her name, speak- 
 ing of her as his mistress. A cruel taunt 
 from a boy in the street to her eldest son 
 opened her eyes to what was said, and to 
 keep the memory of her dead lover's name 
 pure and free from stain, she refused all 
 further help and prepared to seek another 
 abiding-place, for the tongues of the wicked 
 are cruel. 
 
 Then that friend out of his loyal friend- 
 ship, begged her to become his wife, and 
 she for the children's sake consented. 
 
 The snow on the mountain-tops had melted 
 twice, the reaper's sickle had been busy for 
 two summers amidst the golden grain, and 
 once more the Thibetan priest stood in the 
 Burmese jungle, beside the grave where lay 
 the body of "the man who risked it." Beside 
 the priest stood Jarl Ossgood, the Dane. 
 
 " His hour has come," said the priest, then 
 kneeling, he scooped the earth away with his 
 hand, tearing aside the weeds and brambles, 
 throwing the brown earth to right and left,
 
 234 MAROZIA 
 
 until the face of the sleeper lay exposed to 
 the sunlight. It was the same face, but 
 earth brown mother earth had imprinted 
 upon it her unending calm. The [priest 
 bent his head and whispered a command : 
 " Sleeper, awake, the hour has come." 
 
 And he who slept awoke and rose up and 
 shook the grave rags from him, for all his 
 clothing had rotted and the rags defiled him. 
 
 He went to a tiny rivulet that rippled near, 
 and washed, and having washed knew not that 
 he was naked, and the priest bowed before 
 him, for the man had fathomed the wisdom 
 that lies beyond the world. They ministered 
 to him, but neither Jarl, the Dane, nor the 
 priest asked him to share with them his know- 
 ledge. His knowledge what knowledge had 
 he gained ? Let the story tell. 
 
 Jarl, the Dane, brought him clothing, and 
 placed money for his needs in his purse, and 
 he went forth smiling graciously smiling on 
 all things as the spring smiles. An aged 
 woman met him on the highway ; he stopped 
 and comforted her. An old man bearing a 
 burden beyond his feeble strength tottered 
 along the highway ; he took the burden upon 
 his own shoulders and linking his arm in 
 that feeble wayfarer's cried : " Come, brother, 
 the burdens of the weak should be upon the 
 shoulders of the strong."
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 
 
 Surely this man had learnt wisdom the 
 wisdom of the gods. He passed from place 
 to place and none knew him, his fame had not 
 lasted long enough to hold men's minds for 
 two brief seasons, and yet he had been great. 
 Yet the thought brought no grief, he had 
 learnt the value of many things since the 
 day he had slept. He put his stick into 
 a running stream, and, drawing it forth, 
 looked for the hole and found none. "And 
 that is fame," he said, and smiled, and went 
 upon his journey, going as straight as an 
 eagle to its nest, to that London home where 
 his wife dwelt with his friend. She knew 
 him as soon as her eyes dwelt upon his face, 
 and a great shame fell upon her. He would 
 have taken her in his arms, but she dropped 
 at his feet and clasped her arms around him 
 crying : "I am not worthy ; the children 
 hungered, and I gave myself for bread." 
 
 At that he lifted her up and held her in 
 his arms, and talked to her to soothe her 
 pain. Then that other came, the friend who 
 had wedded her, and when he saw them a 
 great wrath filled him, for he, too, had learned 
 to love the woman with his whole soul, 
 for she was lovable above the wont of 
 women. 
 
 " She is mine ! " he cried.
 
 2S6 MAROZIA 
 
 " She shall choose," was the reply. 
 
 " She cannot go to you," cried that other 
 one. " She is soiled to you, for she has been 
 my wife." 
 
 The man who had risked all for love looked 
 calmly at the woman. " Choose," he said. 
 
 " 1 did it all for love of you, and love of 
 my children. 
 
 "Your love was pure," he answered her; 
 " so pure, that the world is better for your 
 loving and your living. Perfect love purifies 
 all it touches." 
 
 She crept to him and laid her head upon 
 his breast with a great sigh of content. 
 
 " But the child the unborn child my 
 child," cried that other. 
 
 " Not your child," said the man who held 
 the woman. " It is the child of your desire, 
 and her sacrifice, and sacrifice claims its reward 
 it is her child. Come," he said, and they 
 went. 
 
 " What have you learnt ? " she asked him 
 when he had told her all. " What is the 
 wisdom of the gods ? Is it fame ? is it wealth ? 
 is it power ? " 
 
 And he made answer holding her face in his 
 hands : " It is none of these things. Wealth 
 is nothing, fame is a summer breath on the 
 cheek of a stripling. The wisdom of the
 
 THE MAN WHO RISKED IT 287 
 
 gods is three things perfect content, perfect 
 love, and perfect charity, but the greatest of 
 of these is the love of a good woman for a 
 selfish man. This I know, for I am * a man 
 who risked it.'"
 
 XVI 
 PAUL THE FEARLESS
 
 XVI 
 PAUL THE FEARLESS 
 
 FOR many years the coming of the spring in 
 the Balkans has been the signal for men who 
 have a blood debt to pay the Turks to form 
 themselves into bands, and sweep silently and 
 swiftly through the rough denies of the Perrin 
 Mountains, into the hinterland of Macedonia. 
 There they are sure to come to grips with the 
 men they hate, for, to do him justice, the Turk 
 never refuses a fight. The insurgents are grand 
 fighters as a general rule, also ; and nothing 
 pleases them better than a flutter with cold 
 steel in some rocky glen, where the pine trees 
 mass the mountain sides so densely that the 
 sunlight scarce can find its way amidst the 
 sombre foliage. Many a grim and grisly fight 
 has taken place there of late years, often end- 
 ing in the utter extermination of the insurgent 
 bandsmen. Quarter is seldom asked for on 
 either side, and as seldom given. Foot to 
 foot, hand to hand, they fight out their blood 
 
 241 Q
 
 242 MAROZIA 
 
 feuds. The mountains ring and re-echo with 
 the trampling of feet, the , clashing of steel, 
 and the wild war-cries of the struggling men. 
 When it is all finished, a soldier's grave is 
 given to the comrades of the victors. The 
 carrion bird performs the funeral rites for the 
 foe. 
 
 I know of no finer training ground for a 
 young officer who really loves his trade than 
 the ranks of a Macedonian band, bent upon a 
 foray under a good leader. The long, swift 
 marches, the camp by the bivouac fire, the 
 wondrous good fellowship, the red wine in the 
 goat-skin bottles, the fragrant tobacco culled 
 from the village farms, the splendid strategy, 
 the night watches, the surprises, the attack, 
 retreat, the rude surgery, the superb self- 
 reliance. It is all great, in its way, and that 
 is where many a gallant young officer of the 
 Bulgarian army is even to-day learning his 
 trade. Should Bulgaria ever need them, they 
 will make matchless leaders that is, those who 
 live. The Turk accounts for a good many of 
 them every year. 
 
 But they are not all heroes in the insurgent 
 ranks. One man I have in my mind at this 
 moment a fellow who was known in mockery 
 far and near as " Paul the Fearless " con- 
 cerning whom the peasant lasses made songs, 
 which they sang when working amongst the
 
 PAUL THE FEARLESS 243 
 
 vines, or when gathering roses for the making 
 of perfumes, or when herding the goats on the 
 hill sides. 
 
 I saw him first in the little village of 
 Rustazechin, where I was camping with 
 Colonel Yankoff's band, which had orders to 
 march on the following day into Turkish 
 territory. He made a warlike picture seated 
 upon a mountain mule, carbine slung over his 
 back, bandoliers full of cartridges across his 
 chest, yataghan riding on his hip, pistols in his 
 belt, and hunting knife, long and curved, stuck 
 in his brilliant sash. His fur cap was tilted 
 rakishly on one side of his head, and his fine 
 leather top-boots gleamed in the sunlight. 
 He sang as he rode a wild war-song that set 
 the blood throbbing in my veins, for he had a 
 voice like a silver bugle. " Who is he ? " I 
 asked ; and a grim mountaineer with scars 
 enough on his body to make a pattern for 
 a carpet, said with a chuckle : 
 
 " That is ' Paul the Fearless.' He is going 
 to say farewell to the maidens once more." 
 
 "Is he such a devil of a fellow," I queried. 
 
 The mountaineer grinned broadly ; for, like 
 most of his class, he had a fine sense of 
 humour. " Come," said he, " let us follow 
 ' Paul the Fearless.' " 
 
 Our horses were standing by, so we threw 
 leg over saddle, and rode after that singing
 
 244 MAROZIA 
 
 figure, and saw the maids come running out 
 of cots and cabins maids who threw flowers 
 at the hoofs of the mule. The rider bounded 
 from the saddle every now and again, and, 
 cap in hand, made melting speeches to the 
 fair ones. They crowded round him at last, 
 and made garlands with which they decked 
 both man and mule, whilst he sang wild, 
 pulsating, soul-stirring border songs, with the 
 clash of steel in the liquid notes songs that 
 made a man hear the galloping of horses and 
 the ripple of musketry ; songs that made one 
 see wounds, red and dripping, with a back- 
 ground of burning, smoking hamlets, and 
 fleeing women running hot - foot from the 
 ravishers. 
 
 " Tell me concerning this man," I said to 
 my comrade, the big mountaineer ; " why do 
 the maids honour him ? Is it because he has 
 a voice like an angel ? " 
 
 " For seven years I have gone with the 
 bands into Turkish territory," answered he. 
 "My father and four of my brothers went 
 with me the first year. I am the only one 
 left; maybe this will be my last journey. 
 (It was ; but that tale would take some 
 telling.) Every year 'Paul the Fearless 'has 
 done as you see him doing to-day. His heart 
 is full of fire ; he is a war-note on the wind. 
 He bids adieu to the maids in each village,
 
 PAUL THE FEARLESS 245 
 
 and bids them think of him in their prayers, 
 should he fall by the hand of a Bashi Bazoujc 
 on some red field. He means it all now, 
 but when he gets into the mountains, his 
 blood will grow chill, and by the time the 
 Turkish watch-fires are sighted, his courage 
 will all have run out of his finger-tips, he will 
 desert, and run away, as he always has done. 
 The maids will mock him when he comes 
 home, and he will sulk for nearly a year ; 
 but next spring he will be out on the war-path 
 again. He says he will die for his country, 
 some day, and so he will die of old age." 
 
 When the band under Yankoff moved off, 
 the fearless one rode in front on his mule, 
 and right gallantly he did scouting work, 
 knowing well that no foe was near us, but 
 at the first sign of a Turkish patrol, he made 
 a rapid move to the rear amidst a ripple of 
 laughter from the whole band. The fighting 
 men called jeeringly to him, but all Paul's 
 battle fever had evaporated, and his white 
 lips framed no song ; but the hoofs of his mule 
 made rapid music on the road to safety, 
 
 That night was to be his last in camp ; he 
 was ill, he said, ill in mind and body. The 
 raw rude air of the mountains did not agree 
 with him, neither did the sound of Turkish 
 rifles that sent the lead zip-zipping in our 
 direction during the evening. He slunk out
 
 246 MAROZIA 
 
 of camp and deserted in the soft starlight, 
 and as he rode back there met him two 
 mountain maids who were carrying wine to a 
 villayet. They knew the deserter, and being 
 out for a frolic, hid themselves, one upon each 
 side of the narrow pass, and as the warlike 
 one came abreast of them they sprang down 
 upon him with wild shrieks and screams, 
 knocking him from the saddle. In the fall he 
 struck a boulder with his forehead, and cut a 
 nasty jagged wound that bled furiously. In 
 fear he scrambled to his feet and drew his 
 yataghan, yelling like a thing demented all the 
 time, for his fancy filled the pass with Bashi 
 Bazouks ; then he fled, slashing in his fury 
 at everything he saw, or fancied he saw, 
 whilst the frolicsome wenches pursued him, 
 screeching Turkish war - cries as they ran. 
 Into the village wine-shop he burst, blade in 
 hand, with his tunic covered with gore, and 
 the mountain men, used to sudden raid and 
 lightning foray, grasped their weapons and 
 sprang out to meet the foe ; but all was silent 
 in the pass. 
 
 Slowly they drew off, and Paul told his 
 tale, a wild, weird tale, of a hand-to-hand 
 struggle with foes whose number increased 
 *- each time he told the story five, seven, a 
 dozen Bashi Bazouks had beset him, and 
 sternly fighting he had won his way to safety.
 
 PAUL THE FEARLESS 247 
 
 They looked at the ugly wound on his fore- 
 head, on the still wet blood on his garments, 
 on the notches in his yataghan, and believed, 
 until the mountain maids arrived leading a 
 mule. And then the hills rang with their 
 mirth, and the maids made a song that fitted 
 a mule and a man as a hair shirt fits a cat.
 
 XVII 
 
 A BUNCH OF ROSES GATHERED 
 IN THE WEST
 
 XVII 
 
 A BUNCH OF ROSES GATHERED 
 IN THE WEST 
 
 " IT is useless, your Reverence, I am past 
 praying for." 
 
 "You are wrong, my son, no man is past 
 the power of prayer." 
 
 The man on the rude bunk in the tattered 
 tent smiled grimly back in the priest's face, 
 but made no verbal reply : yet in that one 
 quick smile there was a lifetime of scorn 
 and bitterness, and the priest looking down 
 with pitying glance on that hard, stern, un- 
 yielding face, upon which the twilight of 
 death was fast settling, knew intuitively that 
 a wild and wasted life was ebbing to its 
 close. He stooped and ran his soft white 
 hand over the brow which carried many a 
 furrow that years alone had never placed 
 there, for he who lay with one foot on the 
 border-line of life, and one upon the outer 
 edge of the unprospected hills of eternity, 
 
 251
 
 52 MAROZIA 
 
 was a young man still young as the years 
 are counted old in adversity and iniquity. 
 
 Outside the tent the night was calm and 
 still, excepting where a burst of rude 
 laughter, or the chorus of a song rang out 
 from one of the many groups of diggers 
 who were gathered around their camp-fires 
 on "Minter's Gully," for the "boys" were 
 "on" gold in Kurnalpi, and a day of toil 
 was ended usually by a night of riot. Now 
 and then the noise fell upon the ears of the 
 dying man, and he would smile wearily, as 
 if the old familiar echoes brought with them 
 mingled joy and pain. 
 
 The priest looked down upon the broad 
 shoulders, and the white, round arms, that 
 looked almost womanly in their nudity, and 
 he knew, for he was a man of the world as 
 well as a priest, that the wreck before him 
 was the remnant of an athlete. He did not 
 know the man except by repute, and the 
 reputation he had borne was an evil one. 
 He had heard of him as a cynic in his sober 
 moments, and as a savage in his cups. A 
 sneering, reckless, ruthless devil, possessing 
 neither love nor reverence for things either 
 human or Divine. One who knew no fear 
 and had no faith; ready at all times to 
 throw a taunt in the teeth of men, and a 
 libertine laugh in the face of women.
 
 ROSES GATHERED IN THE WEST 253 
 
 Men said he was one who would give his 
 last crust to a starving dog, and his last 
 curse to a woman and yet women had liked 
 him as much us men had hated him, and 
 he repaid their liking with careless lust and 
 mocking contempt, until they said that his 
 blood was wine, but his heart was ice, for 
 he was fair to none, and faithless to all.. 
 And now he was hovering on the very 
 boundary-line of his life's lease, so close to 
 Hades that he could almost see the mining 
 experts in the sulphur mines of the hereafter. 
 
 " You had better leave me, father." 
 
 " I cannot leave you to die alone, like a 
 dog, my son. Is there not one man in all 
 the camp whose hand you would like to 
 clasp before the end comes?" 
 
 Again the cold smile flashed over the clean 
 cut face. "Not one, father, no, not one; 
 neither here nor in all the earth. Do not 
 rats leave a sinking ship? Friends are true 
 until the bank breaks ; then good-bye to 
 friendship. I know, for I have tried them, 
 father, and I'd rather die alone like a 
 wounded dog than have those I don't believe 
 in with me in an hour like this." 
 
 " Is there no woman, my son, whose hands 
 can close your eyes and soothe the last dark 
 hour? A woman's sympathy is sweetest 
 when the darkest hours are deepening. Tell
 
 254 MAROZIA 
 
 me, my son, and no matter whom, or what 
 she may be, I will bring her to you if she 
 is within my reach." 
 
 " A woman, father I There is not one in 
 all God's earth whose hand could help me 
 now." 
 
 " Then let me pray with you, for there 
 is one Friend to whom the friendless can 
 turn when earth holds none. You are not 
 of my faith, but as a man and a sinner 
 let me kneel and pray for your immortal 
 soul." 
 
 " No, not that, father ! Let me die as I 
 have lived friendless faithless Godless, 
 and alone." 
 
 " I will not leave you, though you are 
 stubborn in your sin ; even to the doors of 
 death, I will go with you." 
 
 " How long shall I live, father ? " 
 
 " Two hours, my son." 
 
 " Then let me talk if you will stay, and 
 when the end comes, take from beneath my 
 pillow a bunch of withered roses, and place 
 them in my dead hand." 
 
 " Is that all, my son ? " 
 
 " It is all, father." 
 
 Then for many minutes the dying man 
 lay still, with white, set face, looking back- 
 wards down the plains and gullies, and over 
 the hilltops of a wasted life, and when he
 
 ROSES GATHERED IN THE WEST 255 
 
 spoke his voice had lost its rough, rude tone, 
 and he talked as well-bred men of the cities 
 talk. " Shall I take you back over twelve 
 years with me, father?" 
 
 And the priest bowed his head, and went 
 on praying silently. 
 
 " She was my wife, father. Only a slip 
 of a girl, with a gentle, tender face. I can 
 see her now as I could see her then, smiling 
 in all the grace of girlhood the bonniest, 
 proudest face in all the south land she loved 
 me then, and I loved her too. I can see the 
 cottage in the hills the little white cottage, 
 that was built like a bird's nest half shrouded 
 in trees. I can smell even now the moss 
 roses and wild geraniums that straggled all 
 over the great wilderness we called our garden, 
 and the hedge of wild furze that skirted the 
 road. I can see it now as plainly as I used 
 to see it morning and night as I jumped my 
 horse over it and the little creek bordered 
 with pear-trees, where she and I used to sit 
 in the hot noontide in the honeymoon days, 
 and talk of love and the future I can see 
 it aU, father." 
 
 And the priest went on with his praying. 
 
 " I can see him too ; my firmest, bravest 
 friend. I see him now, with his strong face, 
 looking so kingly in the calm of an unspotted 
 life, and the sight of that face brings back a
 
 256 MAROZIA 
 
 pain that deadens the anguish of the gunshot 
 wound in my side." 
 
 And the priest paused awhile in his praying. 
 
 " We were friends from boyhood, father, 
 he was a churchman, though not of your faith, 
 and he stood by my side when my wife and 
 I were married, and his lips were the first 
 to wish us long life and happiness, and his 
 hand was the first we clasped as man and wife. 
 He was my friend, and in all the wide earth 
 there was none whom I loved as I loved him, 
 for he had stood between me and trouble 
 from childhood." 
 
 "And he wronged you," murmured the 
 priest, with white, set face. 
 
 " Listen, father ! One night my horse had 
 gone lame with me as I rode homewards, so 
 I threw the bridle over my arm, and walked 
 up the hillside, and neither the hoofs nor my 
 footsteps made any sound on the deep grass 
 that grew there, so together the old bay horse 
 and I reached a gap in the hedge that faced 
 my bedroom window, and I was passing 
 through, when I saw a man standing in the 
 garden, his head just reached above the window- 
 sill. Are you listening, father ? " 
 
 " Go on to the end," said the sorrowful 
 voice of the churchman. 
 
 " I saw him, and knew him ; it was my 
 friend the friend of a lifetime. Then the
 
 ROSES GATHERED IN THE WEST 257 
 
 window opened, and my wife leant down, 
 and I saw that she had robed herself for her 
 slumbers. I saw the gleam of the lamp on 
 her bright brown hair, and on the white gown, 
 on her arms and neck, as she leant far out of 
 the window. In her hand she held a bunch 
 of roses the same that now lie beneath my 
 pillow. She raised the roses to her lips, and 
 kissed them, then gave them to him, and he, 
 with a light, happy laugh turned with the 
 flowers in his hand, and walked with swift, 
 steps to the gap in the hedge, where I 
 stood and I oh, God ! I did not speak. 
 I could not speak ; my tongue was as iron 
 in my mouth, and the wild blood of the hot 
 south was singing in my veins. 
 
 " He stopped with a little start of surprise 
 when he saw me, then came on with outstretched 
 hand. I, dashing his hand aside, felled him to 
 the earth, with one blow of my hand, and kicked 
 him as a man kicks a hound that has bitten 
 the hand that fed him. Then he staggered 
 to his feet, and faced me with his face all 
 bathed in blood, and being a man, he struck 
 back, and then, I scarcely know how it was 
 done it was an old wrestling trick I had 
 learned in the gymnasium but his back was 
 across my knee, my forearm was across his 
 throat, and I threw all my weight on the curve 
 of his neck. There was a quick, sharp sound
 
 258 MAROZIA 
 
 as if something in his back had broken one 
 low, bitter, awful cry left his lips, and he lay 
 dying at my feet." 
 
 And the priest went on with his praying. 
 
 "Then I picked him up in my arms as 
 though he had been carrion, and with him I 
 took the little bunch of roses, and, passing 
 through the house, I carried my burden into 
 my wife's bed-chamber, and threw the man 
 and the roses at her feet. 
 
 " She, being a woman, understood it all with- 
 out words. She went down upon her knees 
 beside the limp body ; taking his face between 
 her hands she pressed it to her bosom, and 
 kissed the white lips ; whilst I, mad, with the 
 madness of a devil untamed, heaped taunts 
 upon her head and his. And I stood by, and 
 saw her struggle with her broken load, until 
 she placed the dying man upon her bed her 
 bed and mine ; and then she turned, and, 
 taking from my pillow, where she had pinned 
 it, a letter, gave it to me, with the one word 
 coward on her tongue, and then sped away 
 into the night to bring a physician, who lived 
 close by, and I was left alone with him and 
 the letter she had given. I read it through 
 from end to end, and then all Heaven and 
 Hell seemed to open, and the air was full of 
 condemnation. 
 
 " I looked up at last looked at the form
 
 ROSES GATHERED IN THE WEST 259 
 
 upon the bed, and saw the big, black eyes of 
 him I had loved fixed upon my face, with 
 such a gaze of yearning love and pity, that 
 all the marrow froze in my bones ; and, with 
 one bitter cry, I asked my God to let the 
 hills fall down and cover me. He called my 
 name, and I crept close to him. He drew 
 my head down, and he kissed my lips, and, 
 out of his great love, forgave me all and 
 from the letter in my hand, and from his 
 dying lips that never lied, I knew that he had 
 come that night to tell my wife how that 
 evening he had won the promise of her dearest 
 friend to be his wife ; and she had given him 
 the roses to take as a sweet token of her fond 
 regard, with wishes for a happy, hopeful life. 
 
 "And when they came to him, and told 
 him that his life was sapped ; and that the 
 shroud, and not the bridal garb, must be his 
 portion, he told them all it was an accident 
 a horse's blunder in the darkness did it ; and 
 then he placed my hand within my wife's and 
 asked her, for the Man of Nazareth's sake, to 
 let the past be buried with him. But from 
 that hour to this I have been a vagrant on the 
 face of the earth a wanderer without friends 
 or resting place. My punishment has never 
 ceased by night or day, and every hour has been 
 to me a living death. I never met a man to 
 call him comrade, but he betrayed my trust,
 
 260 MAROZIA 
 
 and laughed at me until I learned to loathe 
 the very voice of man. I have known no 
 woman in these long, accursed years who has 
 not turned, when trouble touched me, or else 
 grew weary of me as a passing toy. So I 
 grew weary of the ceaseless pain, and with 
 my own hand I have paid the penalty of the 
 unpardonable crime, for a life for a life must 
 be given. Father, place the bunch of roses 
 so that they will hide the gunshot wound, 
 through which my life is ebbing. Throw the 
 tent wide open, and let me see the camp-fires 
 glisten once again so this must be the 
 ending." 
 
 And the priest closed the tired eyelids, and 
 went on with his praying.
 
 XVIII 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA
 
 XVIII 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 
 
 BEN ASSA we called him. He had a name 
 which his father and mother had given him 
 in his native land, but it was not suitable to 
 our English tongue, so we re-christened him 
 Ben Assa. Why ? God knows ! Why do 
 we do half the things we do in life ? 
 
 I had come to know the fine, soldierly-look- 
 ing man through visiting one of the camps 
 occupied by the Afghans. Not the main 
 encampment, which lies on the flat at the 
 foot of the eastern end of Coolgardie, but a 
 smaller camp which lies near where the minia- 
 ture ranges kiss the sand plain on the northern 
 side of the mining town. A little curly- 
 headed lad of mine had wandered away from 
 home into the bush, bird-nesting, and had 
 strayed off the track ; when, with a child's 
 terror, he had run on and on through the 
 scrub, wild with fright, until he sank down 
 exhausted at the foot of a quondong tree as 
 
 263
 
 264 MAROZIA 
 
 the night was closing in; and it was there 
 that Ben Assa found him whilst watching 
 his men hobbling out his camels for the night. 
 He had picked the little one up in his arms, 
 and had carried him to his tent, and fed the 
 young one with dates and other delicacies of 
 his people ; and had then tucked him securely 
 in his own warm bedding, and had charged 
 one of his countrymen to sit and keep watch 
 over the child, whilst he had tramped in to 
 tell me the little one was safe. 
 
 He looked out of place in the front room 
 of our tiny cottage, with its modern furniture. 
 There was a rough barbaric splendour about 
 the man that would have suited a more war- 
 like setting. He was a big man, tall and 
 broad and muscular ; and his dress for he, 
 with quaint Oriental dignity, had put on his 
 best apparel to visit me in my home was 
 redolent of old Eastern lands. His turban 
 rose, fold over fold, high above his forehead, 
 and it blazed into many brilliant colours. His 
 outer garment, cut somewhat in the shape of 
 the jacket worn by our grandfathers, was of 
 rich ruby velvet, lined with quilted pink silk. 
 The under garment, which showed his mighty 
 chest in all its broad breadth, was of finest 
 white cambric. His lower garments were 
 made of spotless calico, and seemed to contain 
 material enough to clothe a European family.
 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 265 
 
 Around his loins he had twined a great 
 green silken scarf, fold upon fold, reaching 
 from the hip to the centre of the stomach. 
 His face was handsome ; there was something 
 hi the broad, bold forehead, the protruding 
 brow, the full, black eyes, the large, strong, 
 clearly-cut nose, and the resolute jaws, that 
 told in language that nature prints in tints 
 that never lie, that the man was the de- 
 scendant of a race who had lived by the sword. 
 He looked a fighting man from brow to heel. 
 The short, black, curly beard that, falling 
 from his chin and cheeks, just kissed his 
 white bernouse, harmonised well with the 
 dark brown hue of his skin. His large, 
 sinewy, shapely hands spoke of familiarity 
 with weapons of war. They might be at 
 home on the bridle of an Arab stallion, or 
 on the hilt of a sabre, or the haft of a border 
 raider's spear ; but never on tools that betoken 
 drudgery and mechanical toil. So I first met 
 Ben Assa. 
 
 Later I grew into the habit of calling at 
 his camp, and of an evening, when his men 
 were idle, and the long string of camels were 
 unburdened, and turned out to pasture on 
 the harsh Westralian scrub fodder, I would 
 sit with him, and smoke and listen to the 
 story-teller of the tribe chant in wild, weird 
 tones, the folklore and battle songs of his
 
 266 MAROZIA 
 
 people, whilst the everlasting tuneless clapper 
 and tom-tom in the hands of native musicians 
 made life a burden. 
 
 At first they received my presence amongst 
 them coldly, but always treated me courte- 
 ously; for it is as natural for an Oriental of 
 the fighting class to be courteous, as it is 
 for a low-bred European to be rude. But as 
 time passed on, Ben Assa thawed towards me, 
 unbending from his dignified reserve, slowly 
 and by gentle gradations, just as the moon 
 fills gradually towards its fulness. At first 
 we see a tiny streak of silver in the sky, and 
 then as night follows night the silver sentinel 
 expands, until, when its hour has come, it 
 fills out and becomes the eye of heaven. So 
 it was with Ben Assa. Slowly and by almost 
 imperceptible degrees he thawed towards me, 
 and unbent, and then he told me tales that 
 have not yet been written, and, maybe, never 
 will be, by English chroniclers, at any rate. 
 He had fought against the British troops, 
 sometimes with the tribe of hillmen, of whom 
 his father's elder brother was the chief, and 
 sometimes he had fought with the regular 
 Afghan army against the red- coats, and he 
 had many scars and no medals to show for 
 it all. 
 
 " For what reason did you fight against the 
 British troops, Ben Assa ? " I asked him one
 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 267 
 
 night as we sipped our coffee and smoked 
 the sweet tobacco which he gets from 
 heaven knows where and prepares heaven 
 knows how ; but I have blown a lot of it 
 skyward. 
 
 Ben Assa looked at me for a moment, 
 drumming his fingers on the dried sheep-skin 
 bottle at his side. Then he said : " You are 
 of this country of Australia. The home of 
 your father is here. She who gave you birth 
 is here. The wife of your heart, she too is 
 here, and your children, though at times your 
 feet have roamed afar. He whom I have 
 found lost in the forest, and others beside 
 him are here. Have I spoken the truth ? " 
 " You have spoken the truth, Ben Assa." 
 He smoked thoughtfully for awhile ; then 
 he said : " And, my brother, would you fight 
 if some day a strange people marched into 
 your country with flags flying and drums 
 beating, trampling on your laws, overturning 
 your government, defiling the grave of your 
 father, preaching a religion you had been 
 taught to hate, introducing customs you 
 abhorred, and deposing your ruler, taking from 
 you your lands, and making you a bond- 
 race you who have always been free men. 
 If the Japanese landed here to-morrow with 
 arms in their hands, as some day they surely 
 will, would you fight?"
 
 268 MAROZIA 
 
 "Yes, Ben Assa; I and those I have bred 
 would fight." 
 
 " You would slay, and spare not ? " 
 
 "Yes, Ben Assa; it would come to pass, 
 even as you have spoken. It is a man's right." 
 
 " That is what happened to us. The English 
 came, and we fought them I, amongst others. 
 Of my tribe who dwelt amongst the Khyber 
 hills, there is none left, excepting when here 
 and there one is scattered far and wide like 
 unto myself. The English are a great people ; 
 but what is to be is written by the fingers of 
 Fate on the walls of Destiny." 
 
 "You think harm will come to England, 
 Ben Assa?" 
 
 " As certainly as grass follows rain. Russia 
 wants India, and what the Russian wants he 
 gets to-day or to-morrow. A little later or a 
 little sooner. What does it matter ? Time 
 counts for nothing, especially with the Russian. 
 Defeat may come to the Muscovite ; but it will 
 only check him for a time. But you and I 
 will not talk of war, let us talk of something 
 else. This is a land that has never known a 
 war, and it can never be the home of a great 
 people, until the children pluck flowers from 
 battlefields to put on the graves of heroes. 
 You can have no history without heroes. You 
 can have no heroes without war. Eu> hu ! let 
 us talk of something else."
 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 269 
 
 " Let us talk of love then, Ben Assa ; men 
 who have fought much, must have loved 
 much. The hot blood that runs riot in war 
 time must turn towards women in peace time. 
 The wide world never held a fighter yet who 
 was not a lover of women ; the greater the 
 fighter the stouter the lover." 
 
 " Eh, hu ! " laughed Ben Assa ; and his great 
 chest heaved, and his coal-black eyes blazed, 
 and his black beard quivered, whilst the white 
 teeth, like a wolfs fangs, showed through the 
 jetty curls. " Eh, hu ! " and he laughed again ; 
 and a flush like fire seemed to burn under the 
 dusky skin, and the earthenware pitcher in his 
 hands cracked and went to pieces with the 
 strength of his grip. 
 
 " Love," he said. " Eh, hu I How do you, 
 who come of a young people who have never 
 known real war, come to understand the ways 
 of warriors so well. Eh, hu ! but the love of 
 fighting breeds the love of women. I have 
 ridden far in my native land by sunlight and 
 starlight to touch the lips of a woman. Aye I 
 so have I ridden when I knew not but each 
 tree in the ravines that I rode through carried 
 a rifle that would settle me and my wooing." 
 
 " Have you never married a woman, Ben 
 Assa?" 
 
 " I had a wife who was no wife a girl with 
 a face like a flower. She, who should have
 
 270 MAROZIA 
 
 been the mother of many war-like sons, never 
 suckled a child." 
 
 " Tell me about it, Ben Assa, if so be it is 
 a tale a man may tell without hurt or shame 
 to himself?" 
 
 " There is nothing of shame left it died 
 when she and he died. For the shame of a 
 deed belongs only unto the doers thereof, 
 and not unto those who, though standing near, 
 take neither part nor lot in the deed. So has 
 our Prophet taught us." 
 
 " The woman you wedded she is dead 
 then?" 
 
 " She is dead. It is a tale that needs little 
 telling. Thousands have lived, loved, and died 
 who could have told such a story. Is your 
 pipe sweet to your lips ? The tobacco is there 
 in the goat- skin pouch within reach of your 
 hand. See to your comfort. Eh, hu ! I 
 would sooner listen than talk, but if talk I 
 must, why, 'tis the will of Allah so listen. 
 
 " She was of our tribe, the daughter of one 
 who had fought by my side when the hillmen 
 were at war one with the other, and he clave 
 to my side when we raided the borders and 
 lifted the horses of Hindu and Englishmen. 
 No better spear ever rode than her father, and 
 he gave her to me in her childhood, as is the 
 custom with us, and I waited until she had 
 reached the age when a girl is no longer a
 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 271 
 
 girl, and is not yet a woman. The time of 
 her life was like that moment of time which 
 is neither claimed by the night nor the 
 morning a night scarcely finished, a day 
 scarce begun so was it with her when I 
 claimed her in marriage. 
 
 " Beautiful 1 Yes ; but there were others as 
 good to look at in Afghanistan. Still, she 
 filled my eyes in those days, and I hungered 
 to own her, though I had little time for love, 
 for the hillmen had risen and had rallied 
 around the green banner, and our priests were 
 preaching words that no soldier's son could 
 hear and not heed. I had gone with my 
 people into the first shock of the trouble, and 
 had come back to the hills to gain strength 
 from the weakness that had followed my 
 wounds, and 1 had brought with me a prisoner, 
 a Russian officer our men had captured 
 one they believed to be a spy in the pay of 
 the British ; and I saved him only by covering 
 him with lance and sword. He carried him- 
 self like a soldier when death was so close to 
 his eyes that he could feel the chill of the 
 grave on his cheek, and I, liking the way he 
 had smiled when the lance point pressed the 
 white skin on his throat, succoured him and 
 brought him home to my people. 
 
 " The morning I took her to wife, the news 
 came to our camp that Roberts had taken
 
 272 MAROZIA 
 
 Kandahar, and every man who could sit in a 
 saddle was wanted close up to the front to 
 cut off supplies and harass the English. There 
 was no time for love-making, so I took her 
 but once in my arms and caressed her, and 
 she, as became her breeding, buckled my 
 sword-belt, and held my stirrup, whilst I 
 mounted and rode away to the war. Aye, 
 I rode away, leaving her just as I found her 
 a wife who knows nothing of wifehood. 
 
 " For three months I moved with my men 
 from flank to flank, and from rear to front of 
 the British forces, cutting off straggling parties, 
 raiding the camps at midnight, forcing the 
 fighting, though we knew the great English 
 general had made the one move that meant 
 ruin to Afghanistan ; but the men who moved 
 under me were the pick of all the border 
 reivers, and loved the life in a saddle. 
 
 " Three months to a day since I caressed my 
 wife, and rode out with my spearmen, and 
 there came to me one who brought me tidings 
 that made the blood almost burn through my 
 skin. He who came was a cripple a half- 
 brother brother to me by a fault of my 
 father's. My mother sent him. My wife had 
 betrayed me, so that the women made mock 
 of my name when they whispered together. 
 
 " The Russian officer, whose life I had risked 
 my own to save, had been false to me, though
 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 273 
 
 he had sat below my salt. Then, when tired 
 of his toy, he had fled, and entered the 
 English lines for protection, and lay, even 
 then, snugly at Kandahar. If I returned to 
 my people, to deal with the woman, he would 
 escape me ; if she lived, my father's name 
 would be defiled. So I called her sire, the 
 man who gave her to me to wife, and to his 
 beard I told him the tale that my mother 
 had told me, and he, loosening his sword in 
 its sheath, spoke to my face : 
 
 " ' By Allah and our prophet, I will go to 
 your people, and if this thing be not as you 
 have told me, see that thy sword-arm be free 
 when we meet again, no matter where or 
 when. I will turn neither to the right hand 
 nor to the left, till I know the whole truth 
 of this thing.' And I, watching him ride away, 
 knowing my mother's words were true, turned 
 my horse's head and rode towards Kandahar, 
 and my comrades, knowing all, mourned for 
 me as for one already dead. 
 
 " Straight through the British lines, with 
 my sword on my hip, and my lance to my 
 right hand, I rode, and the men, knowing 
 me well, marvelled to see me. 
 
 "The guard turned out, and took me 
 straight to that wonderful little man, Roberts 
 the man of the midnight marches and 
 when I gave him my sword, and laid my
 
 274 MAROZIA 
 
 lance at his feet, in token of conquest, and 
 swore never again to raise hand or horse 
 against the White Queen, he held out his 
 hand, and we clasped each the right hand of 
 the other, as soldiers and men, and he, with 
 his own hands, gave me back the sword that 
 had been mine, and my father's, and my 
 father's father's before me, and I went out 
 to look for the man who had wrought me 
 dishonour, and I found him. 
 
 " He knew, without words, that he and 
 death were once more close together, but he 
 laughed and beckoned me to follow him, 
 touching his sword hilt as a token that he 
 understood what I wanted, and we, without 
 words, walked to a spot where no loiterers 
 could see us, and then he paused, and I 
 came almost upon him with my blade stiH, 
 in its sheath. He turned, and, drawing like 
 lightning struck at me fiercely ; but I had not 
 followed my trade on the borders all those 
 years without learning the tricks of the 
 business, and, avoiding his rush, I drew and 
 we fought. 
 
 " He was mine from the moment the steel 
 met, and we both of us knew it. He was 
 brave, but as I played with him, holding his 
 rushes off and wounding him slightly, just to 
 let him see how helpless he was in my hands, 
 passing my blade close to his eyes, when I
 
 THE WOOING OF BEN ASSA 275 
 
 could have severed his head from his shoulder 
 joint, when, had I wished it, I could have 
 opened a way to his heart, I saw the white 
 rings of death draw round his mouth and 
 under his eyes ; but I would not kill him. 
 Three months of treacherous joy he had 
 passed with the wife of the man who had 
 saved his life, and a swift death was not for 
 him. Each time I beat down his guard, or 
 forced up his sword-arm, I feinted to strike 
 the blow that would have ended the matter, 
 and each time held my hand so that he died 
 a score of times before his right arm, grown 
 limp and weary, fell by his side, and his sword 
 dropped at my feet ; then I drew my blade 
 across his body betwixt the hips and the chest, 
 as a footman hamstrings a horse, and he fell 
 shrieking in the dust at my feet, and I left 
 him to linger the night out. The night 
 watches had brought him pleasures, so I left 
 him to wait for the stars, and death and the 
 jackalls, that he knew would gnaw at his flesh 
 before morning. . . ." 
 
 "And the woman, Ben Assa? Did you 
 never hear what became of the woman ? " 
 
 " She, too, looked up to the stars. Her 
 father rode to the camp in the hills and 
 demanded the truth, and they brought her 
 forth, and the women all spoke with one 
 voice ; and she, knowing the worst had come
 
 276 MAROZIA 
 
 to her that can come to a woman, knelt at 
 her father's feet and bared her neck, and asked 
 for the mercy of the sword ; but he who came 
 from the old mountain stock, who believe that 
 a woman's dishonour is worse than a man's 
 death, refused her request, and carried her far 
 into the mountains, and, according to the old 
 rule of the hills, tied her with thongs by the 
 neck and the wrists, and the ankles, to the 
 hard earth, with her face to the sky that she 
 might look up to Allah, and see in the pitiless 
 sky that there was no pity for her." 
 
 " So, Ben Assa, that is the tale of your 
 courtship and the laws of your hillmen." 
 
 " It is even so. What do you think of our 
 ancient customs ? " 
 
 "Ben Assa, I think that the hills of 
 Afghanistan are the healthiest hills for a 
 man, with a weakness for women, to keep 
 away from, on all the earth. Reader, what 
 do you think ? "
 
 XIX 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL
 
 XIX 
 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL 
 
 JEPSON was young that is, he was young in 
 years; but he had no young follies. Jepson 
 never drank to excess, and he never lost an 
 opportunity of sneering at any man who did. 
 Jepson never by any chance allowed himself 
 to dangle in the train of any woman, and he 
 had a most emphatic manner of expressing 
 his opinions about those who did. Not that 
 Jepson was too moral for that sort of thing, 
 but rather that the blood in his veins was in- 
 capable of being warmed above freezing point 
 by anything except the clink of yellow metal 
 and yet, Jepson was married. He had said 
 to himself that a woman was a handy thing to 
 have about the house, so he had looked about 
 him before coming to the gold-fields, and had 
 picked out a girl who would suit him, and he 
 married her. She was good to look upon 
 fair-haired, blue-eyed, with a tall, shapely, 
 lissome figure. She was also well educated, 
 
 279
 
 280 MAROZIA 
 
 and possessed a gracious disposition, and an 
 average amount of intellect ; but these latter 
 points did not count with Jepson. He wanted 
 a machine-made woman, one who could dress 
 well, and look well at a small cost, and keep a 
 home about him that would be an advertise- 
 ment for him Jepson. 
 
 Long before they arrived at Coolgardie the 
 girl-wife had tried to interest her husband in 
 the affairs that so deeply concern a woman, 
 but Jepson froze all that out of her before the 
 honeymoon was at its full. She had tried 
 mildly and graciously, as only a woman who 
 wants to please can try, to get at his religious 
 views, but Jepson had curtly informed her that 
 he had no views. He regulated his religion 
 according to the religious principles of the 
 people with whom he came in contact. As 
 for her soul well, he really did not care 
 whether she possessed anything 'of the kind; 
 and if she did, he advised her to put it in 
 leading strings, and stand prepared to farm it 
 out on the best terms possible as occasion 
 might demand. 
 
 She promptly abandoned the subject, think- 
 ing that perhaps she had inadvertently stepped 
 upon a sore spot, and she shifted her ground 
 to other and more feminine topics, but Jepson 
 simply looked at her with a cold glance, and
 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL 281 
 
 requested her not to plague him with womanly 
 foolishness ; if she wanted to talk about children 
 she had better make friends with some other 
 woman and talk to her. The poor, young wife 
 wept cruelly over the conduct of her husband, 
 and as a consequence appeared at breakfast in 
 the mornings with red eyelids and black-circled 
 eyes, and then Jepson scowled, and wanted to 
 know if she was going to walk the earth as an 
 advertisement for an anti-matrimonial league. 
 So by degrees she froze into a sort of wooden 
 woman, and became just what Jepson wanted 
 a handy sort of thing to have about the 
 house. 
 
 When Jepson got well down into harness 
 in Coolgardie he did fairly well, for he was 
 anything but a fool. He was a cold, shrewd, 
 calculating sort of man who never drank, 
 gambled, or flirted with the "scarlet robe." 
 He moved in the ranks of the better class 
 set in the great gold camp, and was quoted 
 by long-headed business men as a man who 
 was certain to make his way in the world. 
 
 But there came a day when Jepson wanted 
 money, and wanted it badly. He sat down 
 and schemed. He thought out all the honest 
 ways first, but could see no path out of his 
 difficulties. Then he planned villainy. But 
 he was not the class of man to risk his all
 
 282 MAROZIA 
 
 on a bold stroke in knavery. He planned a 
 forgery as skilfully as he could and he could 
 be skilful above the average. Then he con- 
 verted himself into a detective, and tested his 
 own scheme, and came to the conclusion that 
 it was too risky. So he at once abandoned 
 the idea of forgery. 
 
 He next elaborated a scheme of embezzle- 
 ment which seemed pretty nearly perfect. 
 Again, he converted himself into a detective, 
 and again he found a flaw in his own plan, 
 and abandoned it. He next worked out a 
 beautiful plot to forge scrip and run it on 
 the market ; and he finally settled on this 
 plan, until it dawned upon him that he would 
 have to take others into his confidence, and 
 he was not the sort of person to do that, so 
 the " scrip " business fell through as the 
 others had done. And Jepson was almost at 
 his wit's end to know what to do, when he 
 remembered that amongst his clients there 
 was a wealthy Afghan who might help him 
 over his financial wall. 
 
 Yadoo Mahomet Kurda was young, tall, 
 robust. He had black hair, a black beard, 
 and great sleepy black eyes, which when they 
 rested on the face of a woman, could leap 
 into fire and blaze like quartz crystals on a hot 
 day. His complexion was dark olive, and his
 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL 28* 
 
 teeth were as white as the soul of a girl baby. 
 He dressed beautifully, and was picturesquely 
 handsome in his Oriental way. Green and 
 gold was his turban, deep dark crimson his 
 jacket, white as clouds at dawn his bernouse, 
 and white his great wide trousers. Around 
 his loins he wore a scarf of mingled green and 
 gold, and crimson silk, and upon his ringers 
 rings of great value and beauty. Such was 
 Yadoo Mahomet Kurda. He was never in a 
 hurry, and never out of temper. He had a 
 low, round, soft, fat voice he owned much 
 money in cash, in camels and land, did Yadoo 
 Mahomet Kurda, and that was his chief and 
 only attraction in the eyes of Jepson. 
 
 So Jepson decided to invite the Afghan to 
 his home, to talk over with him the much- 
 vexed question about which the people of 
 the gold-fields were raving loudly to the 
 Government, demanding that all Afghans 
 be transported out of the colony. Yadoo 
 Mahomet Kurda accepted the invitation, and 
 went. 
 
 Then for the first time he saw Jepson's 
 wife, and Jepson, who was watching him, saw 
 the big black eyes change suddenly from soft 
 slumbering tranquillity to blazing liquid light, 
 and Jepson knew that he had the Oriental 
 sybarite well within his reach.
 
 284 MAROZIA 
 
 At that time Mrs Jepson had no idea of 
 the part she was expected to play. 
 
 Jepson sat in his armchair and smoked 
 and talked. The Afghan lolled on his low 
 couch and watched Mrs Jepson under his 
 thick, heavy, eyelids ; she sat and worked 
 embroidery, and knew nothing. 
 
 That was the first visit, a little later and 
 the Afghan was invited again. He came 
 with alacrity, and Jepson smiled under his 
 moustache as he noticed that everything the 
 Oriental wore was rich, and of the finest 
 material, whilst his brown fingers were heavy 
 with rings, set with rare gems. During the 
 evening Jepson did most of the talking, the 
 Afghan bowing gravely at times, and at 
 intervals putting or answering a question ; 
 but his eyes followed the figure of Mrs Jepson 
 every time she moved, and took in every 
 detail of her figure, every curve of her form, 
 which the soft folds of her evening dress 
 displayed so charmingly Jepson had designed 
 that dress. 
 
 So it came to pass that Yadoo Mahomet 
 Kurda was a constant guest at the home of 
 the Jepsons, and Jepson borrowed much 
 money at his hands, whereof he told his wife 
 nothing. 
 
 One night, it was a hot night in December,
 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL 285 
 
 and the window of the sitting-room was 
 thrown wide, Mrs Jepson was leaning out 
 watching the stars come forth one by one 
 whilst the men talked in low lazy monotones. 
 Suddenly silence fell upon the place, then 
 she heard her husband quit the room, and 
 the next moment she felt a breath upon her 
 neck, just where the little waving curls kiss 
 the spine. She turned and saw the big 
 Afghan. His breath came quick and sharp, 
 with a half hiss between his teeth. There 
 was a dusky deep -red flush on his bronze 
 cheeks, and the hand that touched hers 
 trembled. 
 
 She had no need to ask questions. Her 
 woman's instinct told her in one moment of 
 time what the scene meant. She drew away 
 her hand rapidly, and as she did so she 
 felt something in the palm. She looked and 
 saw the great diamond ring that Yadoo 
 Mahomet Kurda was wont to wear upon the 
 third ringer of his right hand. She clenched 
 her little hand and struck him in the mouth. 
 He caught her by the wrist and pressed the 
 clenched hand to his lips once, twice, and a 
 third time. Then the door opened and Jepson 
 entered. He either did not, or would not see 
 the tragedy in the two faces. 
 
 " The night looks beautiful very beautiful."
 
 286 MAROZIA 
 
 It was the low, round, fat voice of the alien 
 that fell upon his ears, and Jepson did not 
 notice the faint tremor in the full tones. 
 
 Five minutes later the garden gate had 
 clicked behind the visitor, and an indignant, 
 outraged woman was standing before Jepson, 
 her figure was drawn up to its full limit, her 
 face was aflame with rage and shame. Her 
 outstretched hand held a big diamond ring. 
 
 She told to Jepson what I have told to 
 you "a black man," she sobbed, "a vile 
 black brute. I did not speak whilst he was 
 here ; I thought I feared you might shoot 
 him. Oh, Jim, in our own house, our own 
 home from a black man, too." 
 
 Jepson did not take the sweet, fair face 
 and press it to his breast to let her hide her 
 burning womanly shame. Jepson always 
 prided himself on being a man of business. 
 He stretched forth his hand and took the 
 ring and looked into the sparkling stone, and 
 turned the bauble round and round so as to 
 catch the light in a score of ways. 
 
 "Throw it out of the window, Jim, dear; 
 throw it after the black beast." 
 
 He smiled. "Throw it after him? Do 
 you know its value ? It is worth five hundred 
 guineas if it is worth a pound. Throw it after 
 the black fool ! not much ! "
 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL 287 
 
 She looked at him for the space of time 
 it would take a hack to cover a hundred 
 yards. All the colour in her body was in 
 her face, and over her neck and breast, and 
 an eternity of contempt was in her eyes, and 
 then she laughed outright ; but the laugh was 
 worse to hear than the soft sob of a wounded 
 horse in the dark. When she spoke she said : 
 "I do know the actual price of that 
 ring now." 
 
 " Yes," he said, raising his eyebrows enquir- 
 ingly; "actually." 
 
 "Yes, actually; it is a wife's shame a 
 husband's villainy." 
 
 " Shame be damned ! You are no fool. 
 The idiot has lost his head over you. Play 
 him for the fool he is, and keep on the safe 
 side all the time. The cards are all in your 
 hands if you have the nerve and judgment 
 to play them ; but mind, not a step too far. 
 Remember you are my wife." 
 
 She walked to the door with head erect, 
 and, turning on the threshold said, oh ! so 
 sweetly : " A wife, yes, a wife ; but no wanton 
 was ever held more cheaply." 
 
 Time dealt kindly with the Jepsons, and 
 much money came to them, but Jepson was 
 not content. He wanted to make one big 
 coup and land himself amongst the " fat men "
 
 288 MAROZIA 
 
 of the world. One big brilliant stroke in 
 mining would make him, but he dreaded the 
 risk. He feared a fall. It was then that 
 his wife came to his aid once more. 
 
 "Make your money over to your wife," 
 she said ; " and then if you fail you will not 
 be left penniless, and my child, that is to be, 
 will have the money that of right belongs 
 to its father," and the thing seemed good 
 in his eyes, and he did even as the woman 
 had counselled him, and she went down to 
 the city of Perth, and a male child was born 
 to the house of Jepson, and when it was a 
 month old she sent for Jepson, and for all 
 of Jepson's relatives to come and see it, and 
 be present at its baptismal ceremony, for she 
 declared that the child should be christened 
 in state. 
 
 And Jepson and all his house even the 
 father and the mother that begat him came 
 to the christening, and it came to pass that 
 when they were all assembled the nurse stood 
 with the sleeping child in her arms, and the 
 face of the babe was covered with a piece of 
 fine linen, and the mother stood on the left- 
 hand side of it, and the man of God who was 
 to do the christening stood on the right-hand 
 side, whilst Jepson stood at the side of his 
 wife, and smiled upon them all, for he was
 
 A COOLGARDIE IDYLL 289 
 
 proud with a rich man's vanity that the child 
 was a man-child and his. 
 
 Then the man of God said : " What name 
 do you desire that I shall give to this little 
 one ? " 
 
 And a great stillness fell upon them 
 all, as the mother stepped forward and 
 lifted up her hand. And the stillness lasted 
 whilst a fleet runner might cover a hundred 
 paces. 
 
 Then she said : " The child's name shall be 
 the name of his father, and his mother, there- 
 fore christen the child Yadoo Mahomet Kurda 
 Jepson," and with a swift movement she drew 
 back the cambric cloth from the face of the 
 child, and lo ! it was as black as the inside 
 of a fasting camel. The nose had the Semitic 
 curve, and the eyes the Oriental lustre, and 
 the lips the Eastern sensuality of a child of 
 the sun. Of its mother the babe showed no 
 trace, but the father its real father was 
 stamped on every lineament, and all who saw 
 marvelled and could make nothing of it all 
 excepting Jepson. He saw and understood; 
 then, she who was his wife stood forth and 
 told them all, and in conclusion said : " The 
 wealth that this man sold me for, he has 
 made over to me, to defraud his creditors ; 
 but I have settled it all every shilling on
 
 290 MAROZIA 
 
 the child, and he is now beggared and 
 ashamed." 
 
 Then Jepson went forth by the banks of 
 the River Swan, and got down upon all fours 
 in the wet mud, and invented seventy-seven 
 thousand names for a fool, and heaped the 
 whole lot on his own head, and hoped he 
 might die before morning.
 
 XX 
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 
 
 THE Widow Bingham ought to have been 
 satisfied with what fate had done for her, 
 but she was not, widows seldom are, perhaps 
 that is why they mostly become wives again 
 at the earliest opportunity. 
 
 When the late Tobias Bingham had been 
 in the flesh, his wife used to assert that she 
 was the most unhappy woman in Canada, 
 and there were some slight grounds for her 
 claim, for " Toby " Bingham, one time lumber- 
 man, but in later years mill-owner, and farm 
 proprietor, was not the sort of person to make 
 home a paradise for any female. He was 
 rough and brutal both in appearance and in 
 speech, and his good-looking wife, who was 
 a great many years younger than her lord, 
 used to hint in her prayers at camp meetings 
 that if it should please the Lord to call her 
 home first, she hoped she might be sent to 
 a cooler region than that which she felt certain 
 
 293
 
 294 MAROZIA 
 
 was being reserved for her spouse. She was 
 very fond of camp meetings in those days 
 and always took a prominent part in the 
 proceedings, but she seldom took the camp 
 preacher to her home after service to regale 
 the good man on corn cakes and home-made 
 butter. Her spouse used to say : 
 
 " Look, Kitty, I don't mind you givin' my 
 good victuals to a tramp, providin' he's out 
 of the house before I've got within kickin' 
 distance, but I won't have my bacon an' eggs 
 an' coffee an' cream, wasted on a man who 
 tells me he won't moisten my lips with a 
 drop o' cold water in the next world. If 
 your preacher fellows say they won't share 
 their good things with me in the next world, 
 they shan't have any o' mine in this." 
 
 He did not interfere with her religion in 
 any other way, but he would not let it 
 influence him in his daily life, and he went 
 on to the end, a rough, tough, money-making 
 fellow, sometimes when he had more whisky 
 than was good for him, or when he had been 
 bested in a business deal, he would make his 
 home a little one-man pandemonium. 
 
 It was not considered in local circles to be 
 just the right kind of etiquette for a camp 
 preacher to drift in to see Mrs Bingham 
 concerning her soul at such periods. Mrs
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM . 295 
 
 Bingham did not like such untimely visits 
 Mr Bingham did not like them, and no one 
 ever heard a camp preacher, who had been 
 through the process, express any great admira- 
 tion for that kind of call. Camp preachers 
 who had the misfortune to choose those times 
 for a soul-searching visit usually came in by 
 the front door and left by skimming over the 
 back fence. 
 
 And yet when Bingham died his widow 
 carried her grief-stricken face over the whole 
 district, and sought sympathy from old and 
 young. 
 
 " He's gone," she used to say ; " my dear 
 one has been taken from my side, and I 
 shall never look upon another like him." 
 
 All the sane and sober people in Allotment- 
 ville hoped most sincerely that she never 
 would, unless she found him in some other 
 neighbourhood. For "Toby" Bingham had 
 left few friends who would have wished him 
 back. 
 
 The camp preacher who performed the 
 burial service was a stranger in the district, 
 and only knew Bingham from his widow's 
 description of him, and according to that 
 account the deceased was a sweet and dainty 
 lily whom no man might gild. Had the 
 preacher been one of the elect, who had
 
 296 MAROZIA 
 
 called on the Binghams by the front door, 
 and left by the back fence, he might have 
 preached a different sermon over "Toby" 
 Bingham's remains. 
 
 " He died as he had lived," concluded the 
 preacher, "at the post of duty, doing with 
 all his might what his right hand found for 
 him to do," which was the truest part of the 
 sermon, for " Toby " had been cut in half by 
 one of his own circular saws, through tripping 
 when hunting a negro sawyer round the bench 
 with an empty rum bottle. 
 
 In the course of time, the fine-looking 
 widow managed to make herself believe that 
 the husband she had lost had been a heaven- 
 born human poem, and she built around his 
 memory a noble pile of virtues, whioh 
 became accepted facts by constant repetition, 
 except to those who had worked for the 
 deceased, or with him. But if time hallowed 
 the memory of the dead, it did not seem 
 to make the widow unwilling to put a mere 
 mortal in the place of the angel she had lost ; 
 still she did not seem quite able to make up 
 her mind which of her many suitors to give 
 her hand to. 
 
 At first it seemed as if Seth Manners, a 
 smart-looking young American, was to bear 
 off the prize, but he lost his grip before the
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 297 
 
 marriage was settled. Seth had first come 
 to Allotmentville apparently in search of 
 work, but he heard of the widow who owned 
 the lumber mill, and five farms, and a number 
 of allotments of land in the healthiest part of 
 the town, and he made it his business to 
 know that her one great weakness in life was 
 camp meetings, and the somewhat hysterical 
 joys to be found in their vicinity. So Seth 
 the Astute disappeared for a season, and when 
 he returned, he was no longer a toiler in 
 search of earthly dross, but a preacher, a 
 searcher after souls, and he stirred the very 
 marrow of the simple part of the populace 
 in the place. 
 
 One Sabbath he preached upon the deadly 
 sin of gambling, and drawing a pack of cards 
 from his coat-tail pocket he proceeded to 
 show how cards were " stacked " by the un- 
 godly. He placed a table in front of him 
 and called a game of "poker" for four. He 
 shuffled the cards with all apparent fairness, 
 and asked a brother in a front seat to step 
 out and cut the pack, then he dealt four 
 " hands," three to his opponents and one for 
 himself. It all looked so honest and simple 
 that not a sinner present felt uncomfortable, 
 but when the preacher held up each " hand " 
 in turn and showed that he had dealt himself
 
 298 MARO2IA 
 
 a full hand and his adversaries only just enough 
 trumps to coax them to gamble, then the 
 sinners who were present began to feel a 
 shade warm, but the sinful card-sharps were 
 hot before he had finished, for not only did 
 the preacher " stack " the cards, and later on 
 plant aces all over his clothes, but he showed 
 how and why it was done ; then having 
 interested his audience, he preached the most 
 soul-shaking sermon ever heard in those parts 
 against the sin of gambling. Later on he 
 turned his eloquence against the drink traffic, 
 and displayed such an intimate acquaintance 
 with the ways of those sinful souls who dis- 
 pensed cocktails, that it was evident that at 
 some time or another he must have been 
 in the trade himself. 
 
 The Widow Bingham was captivated by the 
 burning eloquence of Seth the Preacher, and 
 it was not long before his stylish gig and 
 showy trotting mare might be seen in season 
 and out of season in front of the farmhouse 
 where the widow had gone to reside since 
 the departure of " Toby " to a better clime. 
 Some of the folk talked rather nastily con- 
 cerning Seth and his showy trotting mare, 
 but as they were for the most part single men 
 who would have liked much to handle the
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 299 
 
 widow's money themselves, no one took much 
 notice of them. 
 
 Now, though no one on the allotment knew 
 it, Seth the Preacher was a " brand who had 
 not been plucked from the burning," he was 
 a professional sharper who had fixed his eyes 
 upon the widow's bank account, and meant 
 to have the handling of all the money that 
 "Toby" Bingham had left. He had known 
 "Toby" in the flesh, and knew that he had 
 been one of the most unscrupulous knaves 
 in all Canada. 
 
 When he first began to court the widow 
 he used to sit in the shady, honeysuckle- 
 covered porch of an evening, and listen to 
 the widow dilating upon the many virtues 
 of the defunct lumberman, and at such times 
 Seth used to grin behind his hand and reply 
 that he hoped " Toby's " spirit could be hover- 
 ing near to hear how those he loved spoke 
 of him after he had crossed Jordan. Then 
 the ungodly sharp would grin again, because 
 the thought of " Toby's " spirit being any- 
 where in the vicinity of water was too 
 comical for any emotion besides silent mirth. 
 
 But after a while the recital of "Toby's" 
 lovely character became monotonous, for the 
 widow talked of little else, yet Seth stood it 
 all for the sake of the dead man's dollars,
 
 300 MAROZIA 
 
 though, to relieve his feelings after an hour 
 or two with Widow Bingham, he used to drive 
 to the lonely little cemetery, which was on 
 his way home, and enjoy himself. He would 
 lean up against the low, iron railings which 
 surrounded "Toby's" tomb, and tell the 
 dead man just what he thought of him. 
 He used to tell the widow that he went to 
 pray for the soul of the deceased, and she said 
 it was just lovely on his part. 
 
 He had got to that stage in his courtship, 
 when, sitting half in shadow, half in light, 
 he would draw his chair up to the widow's, 
 and whilst fondling one hand with one of his, 
 would slip the other arm around the plump, 
 soft, yielding waist ; he had to use some 
 diplomacy in doing this, for the lady was coy, 
 but Seth knew his business ; he used to take 
 her hand and press it, whilst he talked to her 
 of Jerusalem, the Holy City. When his left 
 arm stole round her waist, he shifted the con- 
 versation to the blue waters of Galilee, and 
 spake of the soft, warm wind whispering 
 through the cedar trees that lined the banks. 
 Then he would nestle closer and closer, until 
 his cheek rested against hers, and he would 
 whisper of the silver stars that twinkle like 
 the eye of sentinels in the blue black skies, 
 that looked down upon the doves cooing and
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 301 
 
 mating in the olive groves on the Mount of 
 Cedars. Then as her head slid to his shoulder, 
 and her round palpitating body yielded more 
 and more to the pressure of his arm, he would 
 sing in his rich mellow baritone : 
 
 " Joybells are ringing, angels are singing, 
 When the souls of the saved are united." 
 
 Then the nigger serving wench, who 
 generally used to manage to hear and see 
 a lot of this courtship, used to swear that 
 there would be a silence of some moments, 
 when the widow's voice, sounding as if it 
 were being smothered by a moustache, would 
 creep through the gloom. 
 
 ..." Don't, oh, oh ! " . . . " you really 
 mustn't" . . . "Oh, oh, Mr Manners!" . . . 
 "Call me Seth, dear." . . . More silence, 
 broken by faint " oh, oh's," in a female voice 
 "Well, Seth, then," . . . "Darlin'l Oh, 
 you have rumpled my hair so ; take your arm 
 away." . . . "What, when'll I marry you? 
 I dunno." . . . More silence, and more "oh, 
 oh's ; " " Don't talk of marryin', or givin' in 
 marriage, yet Seth, dear, Toby's hardly cold 
 
 yet " Growls from Seth. " Don't think 
 
 Toby ever will be cold ; 'taint chilly where 
 he's gone." 
 
 Another week or two would most assuredly
 
 302 MAROZIA 
 
 have seen the widow transplanted to the bosom 
 of her adorer, Mr Manners, had it not been 
 for an unrehearsed episode, which consisted 
 principally of a giddily dressed young woman 
 with a four months' old baby in her arms, 
 who claimed to be the lawful Mrs Manners. 
 
 When Seth the Preacher saw the young 
 woman and the baby with the widow, he just 
 pulled his trotting mare up sharp, and said 
 some things in the quaint phraseology of 
 the way- back American mining camps and 
 gambling saloons. The language reminded 
 the widow of the deceased " Toby " in one of 
 his explosive humours. 
 
 But the scamp soon regained his temper; 
 driving up to the little group, he addressed 
 himself to the young mother : " Well, Polly," 
 he said with a chuckle, "you've just spoilt 
 the best hand I ever held, spoilt it just as I 
 was goin' to play too ; but it's the luck of 
 the game. Jump up, little woman, and let's 
 get out o' this. Allotmentville will be un- 
 healthy for camp preachers for awhile. Here, 
 give me the baby; now climb. Good-bye, 
 widder, if you ever want to sell them two 
 chairs out in the honeysuckle porch, let me 
 know. I'd like them to remind me of" 
 he laughed "of Toby." 
 
 As he drove away with Polly and the baby,
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 303 
 
 she heard him singing in that mellow voice 
 she had almost learned to love : 
 
 " Joybells are ringing, angels are singing 
 When the souls of the saved are united." 
 
 It was quite a time before the Widow 
 Bingham allowed any of her other suitors to 
 get as far as the honeysuckle porch with her ; 
 and she never saw the two chairs close together 
 without feeling hot all over, because she felt 
 instinctively that that wretch of a gambler 
 would be sure to pave the way to peace with 
 " Polly," by telling her of his courtship. For 
 the same reason she could not bear to hear 
 any preacher make even a passing reference 
 to Jerusalem, or the waters of Galilee or the 
 cedars and olives of the Holy Land. Her 
 love episode had nearly shattered her faith in 
 religion, and religious topics seemed to her to 
 have lost their charm. As for the honey- 
 suckle, she could never more bear the smell 
 of it, and under the pretext that honeysuckle 
 harboured snakes, she had that around the 
 porch rooted up, and the spot where it had 
 flourished knew it no more. 
 
 Abner Jefferson was the next man to make 
 substantial progress with the widow. Abner 
 was the blacksmith and wheelwright of Allot- 
 mentville, a powerfully built, plain - spoken
 
 304 MAROZIA 
 
 man ; who never sang, and who had no great 
 store of knowledge concerning the Holy Land ; 
 but his business was growing steadily, thanks to 
 his sober habits, and love of hard honest work. 
 
 When the widow first began to tell Abner 
 about the mass of virtues Toby deceased had 
 possessed, the blacksmith had squared his 
 shoulders, and looking her full in the face had 
 said : " I knew Toby Bingham, man and boy, 
 for thirty year, widder, knew him well, and 
 there was more real downright wickedness in 
 him to the square inch than you'll find in 
 
 h to the square mile. Put what you like 
 
 on his tombstone, my dear, but don't ask folks 
 hereabouts to believe it." 
 
 He proposed to her one Sunday afternoon 
 as they were looking at a couple of cows she 
 had bought. He told her she looked " homey " 
 and nice, leaning with her arm against the red 
 cow's sleek flank. Then he proposed. 
 
 She said : " No." 
 
 "All right," he answered philosophically; 
 " we won't say any more about it at present ; 
 but every time you see them cows, you jest 
 think o' me." 
 
 It was different to the wooing of Seth 
 Manners, and the widow sighed, for, woman- 
 like, she had liked the honeysuckle episode. 
 
 A month later Abner proposed again, but
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 305 
 
 she answered that she had buried her heart 
 with her husband. Abner, who had just 
 lunched with her, remarked placidly that as 
 she hadn't buried her appetite at the same 
 time, the heart burying was no real bar to 
 matrimony. Her poetic soul revolted against 
 this sort of wooing, and she bade him think of 
 her no more, as she intended to carry her poor 
 bruised heart to the grave. 
 
 But that winter the fates were good to 
 Abner. Snow had fallen as no man had 
 ever known it to fall before, and when it 
 was not snowing it was freezing. The cattle 
 could scarcely be kept alive in the sheds, every 
 living thing in the woods seemed to die off, 
 except the wolves ; and they were so hard 
 pressed that on several occasions they came 
 from the forests and carried off stray dogs 
 from small towns like Allotmentville. 
 
 The " Christian Brothers' " Church was not 
 so well patronised as usual ; folks who lived at 
 a distance preferred to stay at home and pray 
 to going along the snow track through the 
 forest, and risk being converted into lunch by 
 the prowlers of the forest. Perhaps it was the 
 knowledge that she had the newest and the 
 handsomest sleigh, and the best-matched pair 
 of horses in the district, that made the Widow 
 Bingham determined to risk the journey, 
 
 u
 
 306 MAROZIA 
 
 possibly the fact that she had not seen the 
 blacksmith for nearly three weeks may have 
 had something to do with her determination, 
 or it is quite possible that it was nothing 
 more than the contrariness inherent in woman. 
 Whatever prompted her to go is a mystery, 
 but she went, driving her handsome horses 
 herself, and displaying no mean skill in the 
 process. She did not enjoy herself as much 
 as she expected she would, because the black- 
 smith, who had changed the manner of his 
 wooing, did not come near her any more than 
 he was compelled to do. So just as the early 
 night was setting in, she ordered her horses to 
 be hitched to the sleigh, and expressed her 
 intention to drive home. 
 
 " It's only two hours by the new cut through 
 the woods," said she ; " and I'm not a bit 
 nervous." 
 
 Most of her friends tried hard to dissuade 
 her from the risky ride, but a wilful woman 
 will not part easily from her own way. 
 
 Leopold von Gantstadt, one of her admirers, 
 suggested in a very limp and half-hearted way 
 that he should accompany her and see her in 
 safety, but there was no heart in his voice, 
 and she curtly refused, much to the young 
 German's delight, for he had no desire to 
 make a late supper for some half-frozen wolf,
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 507 
 
 not even if the handsome widow was to be on 
 the menu card with him. He had often told 
 her, with tears in his blue eyes, that he would 
 lay down his life for love of her but that was 
 in the summer, when no wolves were around 
 looking for stray morsels. 
 
 Somehow the widow felt foolishly angry. 
 She had an idea that if that rascally gambler 
 Seth Manners had been present, she would 
 not have been allowed to drive home alone. 
 By the time she had got her furs and her 
 gloves on, her courage had well-nigh failed 
 her, for she knew the danger was real enough ; 
 but she knew also that the maids would titter 
 if she flinched at the final moment, and say 
 she had only proposed the adventure in the 
 hope of cajoling the men to offer their services 
 as escort. As for Abner, the smith, she vowed 
 from the core of her heart never to allow him 
 to come near her home again. In this spirit 
 she went to the door where her sleigh was 
 standing, and with trembling limbs climbed 
 up and held out her hands for the reins, but 
 the man who was sitting there holding the 
 horses pushed her hand back. 
 
 "Don't be a fool!" he said gruffly. "Sit 
 tight." And before she could offer any remon- 
 strance the whip fell, and the horses, aching 
 with cold, darted off.
 
 308 MAROZIA 
 
 She did not say a word, but somehow she 
 suddenly felt delightfully warm all over, though 
 a biting wind that carried snow with it was 
 blowing full in her teeth. The man drove in 
 silence, and she noticed with a little thrill of 
 fear that he carried a rifle across his knees. 
 For fully an hour her stubbornness kept her 
 silent, then the strain proved too great. 
 " Can't you use your tongue, Abner ? " 
 
 " I could if I wanted to ; but I prefer to 
 use my ears." 
 
 " What for, Abner ? " 
 
 " Wolves," he answered laconically. 
 
 She shivered in real earnest then, and got 
 closer to him ; for the track through the pines 
 was very narrow, and the black forest lay grim 
 and gaunt on either side. For half an hour 
 longer they sped along, the horses stepping 
 out merrily. All at once she noticed Abner 
 half turn his head and listen, then he swung 
 round, took a tighter grip of the reins, and 
 lashed out with his whip, the horses bounded 
 forward at furious speed, and the sleigh rushed 
 onward. She knew what it all meant, the 
 horses knew it too; they carried their heads 
 far outstretched in front of their bodies, their 
 muzzles outwards and downwards, their ears 
 flattened back, no need to flog them, they 
 did their best without the whip.
 
 THE WIDOW BINGHAM 309 
 
 The widow had got her nerve back as the 
 danger increased ; she turned where she sat, 
 and watched, kneeling on the seat. Suddenly 
 she clutched his arm, three creatures that 
 looked like shadows had leaped from the 
 wood on to the trail not forty yards behind 
 them. 
 
 " See anything ? " he asked. 
 
 " Yes, three." 
 
 " Close up ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Take the reins and drive, we are within 
 a mile of home. Don't let the horses swerve 
 off the trail, if you do, they'll knock the sledge 
 to matches against the trees, and we'll be pie 
 for the pack." 
 
 "I'm a good shot, Abner, give me the rifle." 
 
 " Do as you're told, Mary, I'm boss wherever 
 lam." 
 
 It was the first time he had ever called 
 her "Mary." 
 
 She smiled in spite of her fear, smiled and 
 obeyed ; and a minute later Abner's rifle was 
 talking eloquently. The serving-men at the 
 farm heard it too, and knew its meaning. 
 Picking up lanterns, or blazing logs, or 
 anything that would give a light, they 
 rushed out into the roadway to welcome the 
 travellers,
 
 310 MAROZIA 
 
 " Get the horses out quick ! " shouted the 
 smith, as he sprang to the track, his rifle ready 
 in his hands. Standing thus, he growled his 
 orders as if he was master already. 
 
 " Throw the house door open, drag the horses 
 in that way, don't try for the stable, it's a 
 big pack and a hungry one." 
 
 The frightened horses were easily dragged, 
 and driven into the farmhouse, the servants 
 quickly followed, as a black mass came from 
 the woods towards the house. The widow, 
 standing on the doorstep, called to the man 
 on the track, who was fondling his rifle : 
 " Come in, Abner, come quick, dear." 
 
 He chuckled as he sprang to her side. The 
 door closed, and turning, he kissed her in 
 front of them all, and then went and sat 
 himself down at the head of the table. 

 
 XXI 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 
 
 (A ROMANCE OF JAPAN)
 
 XXI 
 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 
 
 (A ROMANCE OF JAPAN) 
 
 GIROW KIKUCHI was a Japanese diplomat, 
 who had at one time been a person of con- 
 siderable influence, but he had fallen upon 
 evil days. He had been stripped of his high 
 office, and most of his wealth had been taken 
 from him in fines. His enemy, Usiu Heroshi, 
 who hated him, and plotted for his downfall, 
 displayed no pity for his rival when his heel 
 was on his throat. 
 
 "Girow Kikuchi is too fat in this world's 
 goods," Heroshi used to say to the Governor ; 
 " we must press more fines upon him, so that 
 he may become humble, and cultivate a meek 
 and proper spirit" and the Governor being 
 a man born without bowels of compassion, 
 and having a wide palm, and a pocket that 
 was always crying out to be filled, readily fell 
 into the scheme of the spoiler ; and together 
 
 313
 
 314 MAROZIA 
 
 they stripped Kikuchi nearly bare, so that in 
 his old age he lived in a little house built of 
 paper, with his two daughters and a Chinese 
 handmaiden. 
 
 The eldest of his daughters was called 
 " O Yama Bato," which means Little Wood 
 Pigeon; the second, "O Taki San," was 
 named the Sweet Bamboo. 
 
 The Chinese handmaiden was christened 
 " Gi Wing," which in the flowing language 
 of the Old East stands for Woven Cloud. 
 
 Little Wood Pigeon was small of stature, 
 and very sweet her voice was a perpetual 
 caress. 
 
 Have you sat amidst the litter of some 
 sunny farmyard and listened to the pigeons 
 making love listened to the deep-throated, 
 sensuous notes of the blue and bronze beauties 
 courting under the stable eaves, or on the 
 ledge of the gable end of the barn ? If you 
 have, you will have noted how every rolling 
 note speaks for pleasure. You must have 
 noticed how each full, rich, love coo, possesses 
 all the elements of triumph, arid all the sweet 
 pain of surrender. 
 
 When the Japanese damsel spoke to any 
 one, either man or lad, she had just such 
 tones in her voice, but more especially when 
 she spoke to a man in the gloaming. When
 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 315 
 
 she laughed, she laughed from the throat ; 
 right down in the bottom of her throat, and 
 the notes came cooing upwards, just kissing 
 her lips as they passed through, as if paying 
 tribute for the right to be free. She was a 
 tiny thing; so small that at first glance you 
 might easily have mistaken her for a child; 
 but when once you had looked into her eyes, 
 and on the dull, rich redness of her arched 
 lips, if you were a man you would know that 
 she was a woman, and a woman armed at all 
 points. She had hands and feet small enough 
 for a doll, and a mouth just big enough for 
 a prayer, or a sigh to creep through. She 
 hadn't a mouth big enough to swear with, 
 and yet ; well, wait a little while, a tiny 
 cloud often heralds a tempest, and there were 
 many things beside the grace of God inside 
 the delicate skin of Little Wood Pigeon, just 
 as there is in most women as they say in 
 Japan. 
 
 " The best have a touch of the devil, 
 And the worst have a taste of the saint. 
 Mother Nature is Queen of all artists. 
 Only God can see under the paint." 
 
 The Little Wood Pigeon's sister, Sweet 
 Bamboo, was a tall, slender girl much given to 
 obedience and the cares of the household, to 
 the raising of chickens and ducklings, and the
 
 316 MAROZIA 
 
 stemming of rice, a great maker of preserves 
 and jellies, a manageress and economist in 
 the drying and pickling of fish, and yet an 
 adept in the matter of the selection of silks. 
 She loved Little Wood Pigeon very dearly, 
 though she was constantly at war with youths 
 who came around in the starlight imitating 
 the whistling of birds, and the night-calls of 
 animals that prowl by starlight. 
 
 Sweet Bamboo was not averse to the com- 
 pany of young men ; gladly would she have 
 put her hand into that of any goodly youth 
 who would have settled the matter first with 
 her father ; but none of her own caste 
 came awooing openly, because of her father's 
 disgrace, though there were plenty who would 
 have pressed her hand in secret, if she would 
 have allowed them to do so. But Sweet 
 Bamboo was too discreet. She had some 
 poetry in her blood, but not enough to make 
 her forget that secret wooing often breeds 
 open sorrow. 
 
 It was otherwise with Little Wood Pigeon. 
 She would coo and woo with all who came 
 in her way, but the laugh mostly lay with 
 her in the end her lovers went home as 
 empty as they came while she would eat 
 her bowl of rice thrice filled, and then go 
 and sleep the sleep that knows no dreams;
 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 317 
 
 her little cheek pillowed upon her soft, pink 
 palm, just as she had done when she was a 
 baby under her mother's eyes. 
 
 To Sweet Bamboo she was a perpetual 
 source of wonder. At first, worry had been 
 added to the wonder, but that was before 
 Sweet Bamboo had learned that her sister 
 was a woman, born with the power of play- 
 ing with the hearts of men as jugglers play 
 with balls of fire. 
 
 The Little Wood Pigeon remembered the 
 time when her father had been rich and 
 powerful, and his home full of luxury and 
 servants, and it was in her heart to bring 
 about the return of those good times, but 
 she knew that there was but little chance of 
 her dreams being realised, whilst the great 
 enemy of his house, Usui Heroshi, remained 
 in favour in high places. 
 
 He was an evil man who had done much 
 harm to many people in his day and genera- 
 tion, and was hated by many ; but he was 
 feared also, and fear is a good shield always. 
 
 But Little Wood Pigeon did not fear him. 
 She used to say to Sweet Bamboo that a 
 man was like a reed, out of which a clever 
 woman could make her own music, if she 
 only had faith in herself and Little Wood 
 Pigeon had faith of that sort, and to spare,
 
 318 MAROZIA 
 
 but Sweet Bamboo sometimes doubted, for 
 she hated plotting and scheming, not knowing 
 where it might end. 
 
 But there was one member of the house- 
 hold who believed in Little Wood Pigeon, 
 believed in her not only as a woman, but in 
 her power to intrigue successfully, even against 
 men in high places ; and that was Woven 
 Cloud, the Chinese handmaiden. 
 
 So great was the Japanese damsel's influence 
 over this woman, that she would have done 
 almost anything that her young mistress 
 desired her to do without the faintest hesita- 
 tion. She was subtle, secret, and conscience- 
 less as any graven god in all China. To her, 
 expediency, and the commands of her mistress 
 were the beginning and the end of the law ; 
 nothing else was of any moment. Those two 
 understood each other, and waited for the 
 fulness of time for the figs to ripen. 
 
 Every one else but Woven Cloud saw in her 
 master's daughter a pretty little plaything, 
 a living doll, that men might make sport of, 
 and go unscathed but the Chinese woman 
 knew better. When she heard the Little 
 Wood Pigeon cooing in the ears of some of 
 her admirers, the eyelids would narrow down 
 over her quaint oval eyes, until nothing could 
 be seen of them but two slits of dusky velvet
 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 319 
 
 that sparkled like fire. That was Woven 
 Cloud's method of making merry. 
 
 She had never laughed outright in all her 
 life ; people thought her rather dull, and very 
 stupid, but her young mistress knew that she 
 was a mine of deep and lasting intelligence, 
 all the more valuable because no one suspected 
 the wealth that lay hidden away under the 
 surface. 
 
 Sometimes, at very rare intervals, a China- 
 man, who was said to be the woman's brother, 
 would come to see her. He nearly always 
 came at night, and went again before the 
 dawn. When he first began to visit her 
 Woven Cloud had told the two sisters that 
 the man was her brother, who was a travelling 
 merchant in a small way. 
 
 Sweet Bamboo had received the informa- 
 tion concerning both the relationship and the 
 man's occupation all in good faith, and had 
 made the visitor welcome; but Little Wood 
 Pigeon had curved down the corners of her 
 pink lips, and had let the cooing little noise 
 creep up from her throat. She knew, and 
 Woven Cloud knew that she knew, and the 
 knowledge was a bond between them. 
 
 Only once in all her little life did Little 
 Wood Pigeon make a bad slip. A youth came 
 a-wooing not the ordinary lad full of sighs
 
 820 MAROZIA 
 
 and tears and love songs but a stormy lad, 
 who believed in the strong hand, and well, 
 for a season Little Wood Pigeon found her 
 master. It was a thing she kept to herself. 
 
 One day she came home to Sweet Bamboo 
 with a wonderful tale. She had been down, 
 she said, in the rice fields, wandering in the 
 early dawn, and as she wandered she heard 
 a sweet little cry, such a strange little cry, 
 and she had stopped and listened, and all 
 the world seemed still. Wondering more and 
 more, she had pushed through the growing 
 rice, something fluttering at her heart. Then 
 she paused, and looked about her until the cute 
 little cry had come again, a cry that was small 
 enough to reach no ears but her own, and yet 
 strong enough to drown all the world's noises. 
 
 She would have heard it above the tramp 
 of armies, above the howling of wrecking 
 storms, above the rending of a world, for it 
 was infancy calling to motherhood : but she 
 did not tell that to Sweet Bamboo. All that 
 she told her was that she had found a tiny, 
 helpless baby boy lying in a patch of growing 
 rice, and because of its helplessness she had 
 brought it home, and Sweet Bamboo had 
 taken the little thing to her heart and loved 
 it, believing every word. But Woven Cloud, 
 the handmaiden, had drawn her eyelids close
 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 321 
 
 together until nothing was to be seen but a 
 line between the lids like a flash of steel 
 and another link was forged between mistress 
 and maid. 
 
 One morning when all the world seemed 
 young, when the birds were singing at the 
 very flush of dawn, and the flowers around 
 the little paper house were lifting up their 
 heavy heads to the faint breeze that just 
 stirred their petals, and robbed them of their 
 wealth of perfume, Woven Cloud beckoned 
 Little Wood Pigeon to follow her into the 
 fields, and the two women went, the little 
 brown toy-like creature leading the yellow 
 woman, both silent, both secret, both full of 
 resource. 
 
 At the corner of the field that led from the 
 paper house, just where the early sunlight fell 
 and warmed the world, and the bees and the 
 butterflies kissed the flowers, Sweet Bamboo 
 i sat bathing a tiny child in a running stream 
 of limpid water, whilst the old man, her father, 
 lying on the grass smoking placidly, smiled 
 upon both the girl and the babe, thinking 
 the world well lost in the senility of his 
 peace. 
 
 Wood Pigeon and Woven Cloud did not 
 pause, they did not laugh, they only looked 
 at each other, and for a moment the sun stood 
 
 x
 
 322 MAROZIA 
 
 still, time and eternity centring for one brief 
 second on the smiling face of the baby. Then 
 they moved onwards until they were out of 
 reach of all eavesdroppers. 
 
 "It has come." It was the handmaiden 
 who spoke. 
 
 " It is welcome, tell me concerning it I 
 have waited long," cooed Little Wood Pigeon. 
 
 "Your enemy is in your hand, you have 
 only to close your fingers." 
 
 " Speak, then, for I am listening." 
 
 " My brother " Woven Cloud played with 
 the word brother, as a child plays with a sweet 
 morsel on the tongue, and Little Wood Pigeon 
 nodded as one who understands fully "my 
 brother has told me all, and I am to tell you ; 
 it is his wish if it were not, it would be all 
 the same, I should tell you." 
 
 Again the little brown head nodded vigor- 
 ously, and the cooing laugh crept up from the 
 rich, round throat. 
 
 Woven Cloud spoke on. "The enemy of 
 your house is at the head of a plot to stir 
 up a rebellion ; my brother is one of his most 
 trusted agents. He is swollen with power 
 and thinks to make himself greater than he 
 is. He is sending letters far and near, letters 
 that speak for rebellion and bloodshed. He 
 is one who puts fire into a field of flax, and
 
 LITTLE WOOD PIGEON 323 
 
 will not wait for the wind, but fans it with 
 his own hands." 
 
 " And the letters where are they ? " 
 Woven Cloud drew a sheaf of letters from 
 the bosom of her gown and put them into 
 the tiny outstretched hands of her mistress. 
 Then she said : " There are the man's letters, 
 and the man's head all in one." He brought 
 ruin to your family, the strings of his life are 
 now between your finger and thumb. 
 
 With the sheaf of letters hidden in her 
 sleeve, Little Wood Pigeon called upon the 
 chief representative of the Mikado, as he sat 
 in the town of Yalu, and he, being a wise 
 man, read them first, and spoke afterwards 
 for he knew a woman when he saw one, 
 and when he had read the evidence, he made 
 careful but very secret enquiries, and at the 
 end thereof he sent for Little Wood Pigeon, 
 and said : " Your father is to be restored to 
 his old post, for an enemy lied away his fair 
 fame ; but the head of his enemy is even now 
 on the end of a pole where four roads meet, 
 as a warning to others like him. 
 
 "Is there anything that can be done for 
 you ? I am told that there is a child that 
 was found in the rice fields at the dawn of
 
 324 MAROZIA 
 
 a summer's day. Can anything be done for 
 the little thing that was sent by the gods ? " 
 
 "Let it remain with my sister; Sweet 
 Bamboo would die if it were taken from 
 her, for she loves it as if it were her own," 
 said Little Wood Pigeon, looking steadily 
 into the unfathomable eyes of the great man, 
 with eyes as inscrutable as his own. " It was 
 sent by the gods in the days of our poverty 
 and disgrace ; we will cling to it now in the 
 dawn of our prosperity and wealth, lest the 
 gods grow angry with us ; but," she added, 
 and her eyes flashed a look into his, which 
 answered as steel answers steel, "if ever I 
 meet the father who deserted it in its evil 
 hour, he will wish that he, and not the child, 
 had never been born." 
 
 And the great man who understood women, 
 stroked his chin as she passed out of his sight 
 stroked his chin and put up a prayer to his 
 God, that no son of his might prove to be 
 the father of the foundling of the rice fields.
 
 XXII 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH
 
 XXII 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH 
 
 WE had picketed our camels close to the 
 camp fires, instead of allowing them to roam 
 about in search of food among the salt bush, 
 because the blacks were bad in the district 
 in which we had gone to prospect for gold. 
 Though they were too cowardly to attack a 
 well-armed party of adventurers, all of whom 
 were inured to danger and sudden surprises, 
 yet, as we well knew, they were quite capable 
 of sneaking upon straying camels in the star- 
 light. And a spear thrust is an easy matter 
 when you have to deal with a non-fighting 
 creature like a camel. As the success of our 
 operations was largely bound up in our camel 
 teams we were very careful. 
 
 I had charge of the party, and the men 
 were all picked for their knowledge of bush 
 craft, and their indomitable pluck. Nearly all 
 of them were grey-beards, who had sampled 
 hardships in every form ; men who could live
 
 328 MAROZIA 
 
 on the smell of an oil rag, and camp, if need 
 be, upon granite ; hard, roving, silent men 
 who looked upon life as a gamble, and cared 
 not how the game went, so long as they had 
 what they termed " a run for their money." 
 
 The camp fires were blazing merrily, our 
 supper was below our belts, our arms lay 
 ready for a sudden call. The camels, savage 
 because they could not roam at will in the 
 starlight, were chewing the cud, and hiccough- 
 ing and snarling as only camels can. 
 
 We were taking things easy. It had been 
 a hard day, for we had pushed inland far and 
 fast to reach this spot, because at this camp 
 we had to meet two of our party who had 
 gone ahead to find an ancient bush recluse, 
 who was said to have the secret of great 
 gold deposits in his possession. He was a 
 half-wild man, who had been sent out to 
 Australia as a convict for the term of his 
 natural life, and had consorted with no white 
 man since the day the Government of West 
 Australia had granted him ticket-of-leave. 
 
 We were not anxious about our two 
 comrades, for Billy Frost and Jim Connelly 
 were men who could go anywhere and do 
 pretty nearly anything that human beings 
 dare attempt. So I gave the order, a rare 
 one at all times with prospectors, to pass
 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH 329 
 
 around a tot of rum to each man, and we 
 sat with the tin pannikins in our hands, 
 sipping and smoking in the glow of the 
 bivouac fires. 
 
 All at once a kangaroo hound that had 
 been crouching at my feet rose, and with 
 ears pricked up, began to sniff the night air. 
 A moment later the brute barked, and I 
 thought he had scented some black fellow 
 creeping in the bushes near the camp, but a 
 moment afterwards the hound gave a short 
 joyous yelp, and sprang away into the night, 
 and we knew who was coming it was Jim 
 Connelly's dog. 
 
 One of the men, with that good nature 
 which camp life breeds, at once rose from his 
 comfortable resting-place and slung a " billy " 
 over the fire to make tea, another laid out 
 a frugal supper, and by the time this was 
 done the men we were waiting for arrived. 
 Frost and Connelly were mounted upon two 
 of our fastest riding camels. The stranger 
 with them rode a mule. He was a large, 
 loose-jointed man with a long, white beard 
 that nearly touched his belt. On his back 
 he carried his "swag" as most nomads of 
 his kind and class do, for they spend their 
 lives wandering from one spot to another, 
 and have no settled abode.
 
 830 MAROZIA 
 
 Whilst this personage was having his supper 
 Jim Connelly whispered to me that in his 
 belief the nomad was as " cranky as a cock- 
 roach, but," he added, " he knows two things, 
 and knows 'em well." 
 
 "What may those two things be, Jim?" 
 I demanded. 
 
 " Well," answered Jim, " he knows this 
 part of the bush better than he knows his 
 own whiskers ; knows every rock and shrub, 
 every grass patch and water hole. If there 
 is metal anywhere here, that old ticket-of- 
 leave man knows where it is to be found, 
 and he knows how to play the fiddle as no 
 other man that ever lived can play it. We've 
 camped with him for four nights, and he has 
 played each night in a way that has given 
 me the jumps. Billy Frost and I bargained 
 to go and find him, and to bring him here, 
 but I wouldn't camp alone with him for a 
 month if you gave me a Sunday suit made 
 of diamonds." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " You wait until you've heard him play, 
 and you won't ask 'why not.' He talks to 
 his infernal fiddle as if it were a living thing 
 a thing he hated, too ; something he wanted 
 to torment and torture." 
 
 I smiled, thinking that the grey ghostliness,
 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH 331 
 
 the awful uncanny silence and loneliness of 
 the bush we had been travelling in so long 
 had at last got on to the steel-edged nerves 
 of the stoutest-hearted bushmen I had ever 
 met. 
 
 " Better have a small drop out of the stone 
 jar, Jim, old man," I said. "You're a bit 
 knocked up and undone." 
 
 He took the jar and the pannikin, and as 
 he lifted the brown medicine to his lips, he 
 remarked : " Yes, I am a bit undone, and 
 you'll feel that way too when you've heard 
 that fiddle and heard Old Whiskers talking 
 to it, cursing and blaspheming, with blood 
 in his eyes and foam upon his lips. You're 
 awfully fond of stories, and I know you love 
 nothing better than to get these old convicts 
 to tell you their life history, as they sit o' 
 nights round your camp fire. Well, if you 
 can make this cranky beggar tell the story 
 of that fiddle, I'll bet you will hear something 
 that will make your hair walk. ..." 
 
 After supper that bush derelict talked to 
 us of gold that lay hidden in a dry salt lake. 
 He talked like a man who knew his subject 
 by heart, and for a couple of hours we hung 
 upon his words. We knew who he was knew 
 that he was a "lifer," a man who had been 
 found guilty of some horror or another in
 
 332 MAROZIA 
 
 England, but there were many such in the 
 far-back country, and we were too used to 
 that sort of thing to mind much. 
 
 At last we shook out our blankets and 
 prepared to turn in, but " Old Whiskers," 
 as Jim irreverently called the derelict, drew 
 from his swag a fiddle of uncouth make and 
 shape, evidently manufactured either by him- 
 self or by some brother wanderer. 
 
 The nomad became a transformed being as 
 soon as he had his crude fiddle in his hands. 
 He sat and gazed at it for a while in silence, 
 then his whole body became convulsed with 
 rage. His hair and his beard fairly bristled. 
 He picked up the bow and played a few 
 preliminary notes, then he crouched forward 
 and drew the bow slowly backwards and 
 forwards across the strings. And out upon 
 the night air came sounds that set my teeth 
 on edge. I have heard a lot of music in 
 my time, but never anything like that. It 
 was like the screaming and wailing of a 
 human being in torment. Faster and faster 
 moved the bow, and the wailing changed to 
 shrieking. 
 
 One by one the men sat up in their 
 blankets. Some of them put their fingers in 
 their ears, some threw pannikins or meat-tins 
 at the player, but he heeded no one. He
 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH 333 
 
 talked as he played, cursing, snarling, laugh- 
 ing madly ; and all the time the violin emitted 
 those unearthly sounds. 
 
 My Afghan servant came and crouched 
 close to me. " That old man got a devil," 
 he said. 
 
 If he had ventured the opinion that the 
 violinist had got ten or a dozen devils I should 
 not have felt like disagreeing with him. 
 
 Billy Frost tossed away his blankets and 
 saddle, and sprang up. " Look here," he 
 cried, " I'll stand that old lunatic asylum in 
 trousers no longer. If you don't stop him I 
 will. I'll burn that blessed fiddle no matter 
 what happens." 
 
 He strode over to the nomad, but the man 
 rose and dashed off into the night, and we 
 could hear him playing hour after hour. It 
 was awful, even the dogs seemed to know 
 that there was something unholy, uncanny, 
 in those sounds. Every now and again we 
 heard shrieks of maniacal laughter mingling 
 with the music, followed by wild volleys of 
 curses that were intended for some human 
 being. 
 
 At last silence came, and we went out to 
 seek for this half-demented man, and found 
 him lying exhausted amidst some coarse 
 tussock grass. His face was turned up to
 
 334 MAROZIA 
 
 the skies, his beard was covered with foam, 
 and in his right hand he clutched his riddle. 
 We carried him to the camp, and laid him 
 by the fire ; and after a while he came to 
 himself again. Then I pushed the rude fiddle 
 in front of him, and said: "Tell me the 
 history of that thing." 
 
 He wavered a moment, but Jim Connelly 
 thrust a pannikin of rum in his old hands, 
 and he began to talk whilst the gold-hunters 
 gathered closer round him. He was slow of 
 speech at first, but soon his words came like 
 a flood. 
 
 " I am a ticket-of-leave-man. I was sent 
 out of England to Western Australia for 
 hurting a man. I had no spite against the 
 man I nearly killed. I assaulted him in order 
 that I might be sent to the penal settlements. 
 I wanted to find a man who was ' doing 
 time,' and the only way to lay my hands 
 upon him was to get a life sentence." 
 
 He stopped talking, picked up the fiddle, 
 and, yelling with wild laughter, began to 
 play until Jim Connelly tore the bow away 
 from him. Then he resumed his tale. 
 
 " I found him ! I found him ! " he said. 
 " And he is here." He slapped the fiddle with 
 his open palm. " I've got his soul in here, 
 and I torture and torment him every night.
 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH 335 
 
 I shall do so as long as I live. He was a 
 devil, and I am making him pay for his 
 sins." 
 
 " Why ? " I asked, as soothingly as I could 
 speak. 
 
 "Because he ruined Elsie Moir; bonnie, 
 winsome Elsie Moir, the pride of the Essex 
 coast. I was a sailor, and she was the daughter 
 of a man who owned a dozen fishing smacks. 
 He stole her love from me, and ruined her, 
 body and soul." 
 
 He ran his fingers along the fiddle strings, 
 and made them squeal. We stopped him ; 
 then he spat on the fiddle and talked 
 again. 
 
 " I was away with my ship when he met 
 her." (He pointed to the fiddle every time he 
 said he. ) " I was chief officer, and Elsie and I 
 were soon to have married. He won her love 
 somehow. They called him a gentleman, a 
 handsome fellow, who lured her away to 
 London after getting her to go through a 
 mock marriage. The ' parson ' who performed 
 that ceremony was no clergyman, only one 
 of his cursed companions. She found it out 
 soon, but she had given him her heart a 
 good woman's gift to a bad man. Then there 
 came a day when the police were hunting him 
 for coining and uttering bad money. He had
 
 336 MAROZIA 
 
 used her to pass the spurious coins, which she 
 had done in all innocence, knowing nothing 
 of forgery. 
 
 " He slunk out of it with devilish cleverness, 
 and left her to bear the brunt of it all. And 
 she stood up white-faced and beautiful in the 
 dock and refused to say a word to clear her- 
 self for fear of convicting him, and he, the 
 coward, stood there in the crowded court and 
 never lifted a finger to save her. He heard 
 her sentenced to transportation, and knew 
 that she would be sent to herd with the vilest 
 women the world owned. And he let her 
 go to her doom, which was a thousand times 
 worse than death to a girl like that a girl 
 who had never done an evil thing in all her 
 life. 
 
 " They sent her out in a convict ship, sent 
 her among devils who were steeped to the lips 
 in every kind of vice and crime. And he, the 
 hound, went free. When I came back from 
 sea I heard of it all, and I threw up my berth 
 to go in search of him ; but he slipped through 
 my fingers and I never saw him until he again 
 stood in the dock at the Old Bailey charged 
 with just such another crime. He was con- 
 victed, and he, too, was sent across the seas. 
 But I was not satisfied ; I wanted vengeance 
 for the ruin of a woman's life, and I struck a
 
 THE FIDDLE OF DEATH 337 
 
 man down in mad rage in order to be near 
 him. I was three years in the chain gang 
 before I ever heard of my enemy, but I did 
 hear of him at last. He had escaped from 
 prison, and was known to be in hiding in 
 the bush, and no policeman could find him. 
 Then I beset myself to the task of getting 
 out on ticket. 
 
 " No man worked as hard, or as well as I ; 
 no man behaved better, and in time I was 
 recommended by the warders to the governor, 
 and my ticket-of-leave was granted me. It 
 was then that I set myself to find the woman 
 I had loved, the woman who was to have 
 been my wife, the woman he had dragged 
 down into the pit. And I found her an 
 inmate of the lunatic ward of a penal settle- 
 ment." 
 
 He snatched the bow from Jim Connelly's 
 hands and made the violin howl and screech 
 until he drove us nearly frantic. 
 
 " Did you ever find the man who ruined 
 Elsie Moir?" I demanded. 
 
 " Yes," he jibbered ; " yes, I found him. It 
 took me years to do it; but he is there there 
 there ! " His horny fingers pointed straight 
 into the fiddle. " You think I'm mad ; I'm 
 not. He is there. I followed every clue. I 
 tracked him patiently for years. The police
 
 338 MAROZIA 
 
 had given him up for lost or dead, but I 
 searched on, and I found him in the bush. 
 He had made money somehow, and had 
 settled down as a respectable sheep-farmer, 
 and no one suspected him. He had blinded 
 the law, but he could not blind the man who 
 had loved sweet Elsie Moir. 
 
 " I got him to myself at last, got him where 
 none could come between us. He was a 
 strong man, with long, sinewy arms, and one 
 evening he was boasting of his strength, and 
 showed me the sinews that ran along his 
 wrists. 
 
 " ' They are tough enough to make fiddle 
 strings,' he cried, clenching his ringer to make 
 the sinews stand out higher and higher. 
 
 " * Tough enough to make fiddle strings,' 
 his words put an idea into my brain, ' Tough 
 enough to make fiddle strings.' 
 
 " In those arms he had held Elsie Moir in 
 all her beauty ; my Elsie, the girl who had 
 known the torments of prison and the prison 
 mad-house. Then I sprang upon him, and 
 held him by the throat and shouted her name 
 in his ears, 'Elsie Moir' 'Elsie Moir.' 
 And so I held him till he died. There 
 was no one to see, no one to help." 
 
 The nomad began to laugh. Then he 
 snatched up the fiddle again. "Listen," he
 
 339 
 
 cried. " Listen ! " again that awful music 
 came screeching forth. He was on his knees 
 as he played, and as the bow crossed and 
 recrossed the strings he peered down as if 
 looking into the face of the man he had killed. 
 And the fiddle shrieked "Elsie Moir Elsie 
 Moir." 
 
 Next morning he had gone and there were 
 no volunteers to go and look for him. But 
 we all looked at the sinews in our own arms 
 and shuddered. 
 
 THE END
 
 PRINTED AT THE EDINBURGH PRESS, 
 9 AND II YOUNG STREET.
 
 THE BLUE LAGOON 
 
 By H. DE VERE STACPOOLE, 
 
 Author of "The Crimson Azaleas," etc. 6s. 
 
 The Times says : " Picturesque and original 
 . . . full of air and light and motion." 
 
 The Daily Telegraph says : "A haunting! y 
 beautiful story." 
 
 The Globe says : " Weirdly imaginative, 
 remote, and fateful." 
 
 The Evening Standard says : "A master- 
 piece. ... It has the gift of the most vivid 
 description that makes a scene live before 
 your eyes." 
 
 The Sunday Times says : " A very lovely 
 and fascinating tale, by the side of which 
 'Paul and Virginia' seems tame indeed." 
 
 The Morning Leader says : " It is a true 
 romance, with an atmosphere of true romance 
 which few but the greatest writers achieve." 
 
 The World says : " Original and fascinating." 
 The Nottingham Guardian says: "A 
 
 singularly powerful and brilliantly imagined 
 
 story." 
 
 The Daily Chronicle says : " Many able 
 authors, an unaccountable number, have 
 written about the South Sea Islands, but 
 none that we know has written so charmingly 
 as Mr. de Vere Stacpoole in 'The Blue 
 Lagoon.' " 
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN, i ADELPHI TERRACE, LONDON
 
 EVE'S APPLE 
 
 By ALPHONSE COURLANDER, 
 
 Author of "The Sacrifice," "The Task- 
 master," and "Seth of the Cross." 6s. 
 
 The Observer says : " Mr. Courlander 
 displays remarkable ability in delineating 
 character; his dialogue is fresh, witty, and 
 natural. . . . 'Eve's Apple' is thoroughly 
 interesting, refreshingly original, and undeni- 
 ably clever." 
 
 The Morning Leader says : "A very clever 
 and powerful psychological study. Its 
 strength is in its detail and subtlety, in the 
 play of many characters and the range of 
 emotions. It is a vivid and attractive novel." 
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN, i ADELPHI TERRACE, LONDON
 
 AN OUTCAST OF 
 THE ISLANDS . . 
 
 By JOSEPH CONRAD. New Im- 
 pression. 6s. 
 
 The Saturday Review says : . . . " Surely 
 this is real romance the romance that is real. 
 Space forbids anything but the merest recapi- 
 tulation of the living realities of Mr. Conrad's 
 invention of Lingard, of the inimitable 
 Almayer, the one-eyed Babalatchi, the Natur- 
 alist, of the pious Abdulla all novel, all 
 authentic. Enough has been written to show 
 Mr. Conrad's quality. He imagines his scenes 
 and their sequence like a master ; he knows 
 his individualities and their hearts ; he has a 
 new and wonderful field in this East Indian 
 novel of his. . . . Greatness is deliberately 
 written ; the present writer has read and 
 re-read his two books, and after putting this 
 review aside for some days to consider the 
 discretion of it, the word still stands." 
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN, i ADELPHI TERRACE, LONDON
 
 THE BEETLE. A MYSTERY 
 
 By RICHARD MARSH. Illustrated. 
 Eleventh Edition. 6s. 
 
 
 The Daily Graphic says: "'The Beetle' 
 is the kind of book which you put down 
 only for the purpose of turning up the gas 
 and making sure that no person or thing 
 is standing behind your chair, and it is a 
 book which no one will put down until 
 finished except for the reason above de- 
 scribed." 
 
 The Speaker says : " A story of the most 
 terrific kind is duly recorded in this ex- 
 tremely powerful book. The skill with which 
 its fantastic horrors are presented to us is 
 undeniable." 
 
 T. FISHER UNWIN, i ADELPHI TERRACE, LONDON
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
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