At the door of the H?tel Grammont, Grey and O’Hara stood for some little time in conversation. As they were about to part, O’Hara asked: “You haven’t a revolver, have you?”

“No,” Grey answered, carelessly. “Shall I need one, do you think?”

“After your experience of last night it seems to me it would be just as well to sleep with one under your pillow.”

Grey laughed.

“I don’t fancy I shall be disturbed again,” he said.

“I’ll run over to my place and get you one,” O’Hara insisted. “I shall be back in ten minutes.”

As he went off at a brisk walk Grey turned into the wide passage that gave entrance to the court. The portier was not visible, but at the foot of the narrow stairway to the right a man who in the150 dim light had the appearance of one of the hotel valets, addressed him.

“Captain Lindenwald has returned, Monsieur Arndt,” he said, quietly, respectfully; “he met with an accident and has come back. He begs that Monsieur Arndt will see him before retiring.”

For a moment Grey stood silent in surprise.

“An accident?” he queried, recovering himself.

“Yes, monsieur. His train ran into an open switch at Villieurs. His leg is broken in two places, and he is injured internally. I will show monsieur to his room.”

As he led the way to the floor above and along a passage towards the back of the house where Herr Schlippenbach’s room had been, Grey marvelled over this new twist in the thread of fate. That the Captain had returned to this hotel and had sent for him argued, he thought, that there must have been some mistake or misunderstanding as to his departure. If he had meant to desert his charge he would not under any circumstances have acted in this fashion. Perhaps—indeed it was quite possible—he had left a letter which some stupid French servant had failed to deliver,151 or it might simply have been his intention to spend Sunday out of Paris, giving Lutz and Johann permission to take a brief holiday as well. O’Hara had said something about their luggage being gone, but that might have been an error, too.

At a turn in the passage Grey’s guide halted before a door and rapped, playing, as it were, a sort of brief tattoo on the panel with his knuckles; and at the same time a waiter passed on his way to the rear stairway.

An instant later the door was opened by someone who shielded himself behind it. The man who had led the way and done the rapping stepped back, and the American, his eyes a little dazzled by the light, put a foot across the threshold. Just what followed Grey never exactly knew. A myriad brilliant, sparkling, rapidly darting specks of fire filled his vision. In his ears was a thunderous rushing sound like a storm sweeping through a forest—a swollen river churning through rocky narrows. His body seemed dropping through interminable space, gaining momentum with every foot of its fall, but shooting straight, straight downward without a swerve; the lights flashing152 by him, the winds roaring past him as he sped. An agony of apprehension seized him. He was going to be crushed to atoms; mangled, broken, distorted. He tried to raise his arms, to clutch at the impalpable, but they were held down as if by leaden weights. To bend a knee, to lift a foot, to cry out, were alike impossible of achievement. And then, with a crash that split his ears, that tore every joint asunder, that racked every nerve, muscle, sinew and tendon, the end came. The myriad sparks, like the countless flashing facets of countless diamonds, were drowned in blackest night and the terrifying rush of furious winds and frantic waves was hushed in a silence profound and awful—the blackness and the silence of unconsciousness.

Very gradually, but in much shorter time than he fancied, or than his assailants expected, he recovered command of his faculties and became aware that he was lying upon a couch, an improvised gag in his mouth, his arms pinioned in a most uncomfortable way at his sides, and his feet bound together with cords that cut cruelly into the flesh of his ankles. He realised then that he had153 been led into a trap and had been sandbagged or otherwise assaulted as he entered it. His mind was still busy with Lindenwald and his motives, he fancied at first that he was responsible for this outrage, and warily, between his lashes, with his eyes scarcely opened, he glanced about the room in search of this gallant member of the Budavian royal household.

There were, however, but two persons present, and Lindenwald was not one of them. One was the little man whom he had mistaken for a hotel valet and who had lured him to his downfall; and the other was a tall, burly, bearded fellow, with a low forehead and sinister, bloodshot eyes. The two were standing near an open window and the larger man had in his hands a thick hempen rope, one end of which Grey observed was knotted about the heavy post of an old-fashioned mahogany bedstead which stood against the opposite wall. On more careful inspection he saw that the man was deliberately making a slip knot of the pattern known as a hangman’s noose. The only light in the room was that given by a single candle, but it sufficed for Grey to gather these details.

154 The smaller man leaned out of the window for a moment, and on drawing in his head he turned to the other with the remark:

“The carriage is there. Make haste with your knot. I’m not in love with this business.”

He spoke in German and his partner replied in the same tongue.

“Have patience,” he said, calmly; “it’s a heavy body we’ve got to lower and the knot must be strong. There’s plenty of time. He won’t come to himself for hours, and there’s no fear of anyone interrupting us now.”

“Don’t be too sure of that,” was the reply, in a tone of nervous apprehension; “we have been here too long as it is. If we should fail at the last minute, the Baron would——”

“S—sh!” warned the other, “no names is safer. Just another wrapping now and she’ll hold all right. Some wrap it seven times and some only five, but I’m giving it nine, to be sure.”

He had scarcely finished the sentence when a blow, aggressive and imperious, sounded on the door. The younger man started nervously, but155 the other just phlegmatically lowered his work and raised his head.

“What’s that mean?” he whispered.

“God knows!&rdquo............