Instantly the unhappy culprit, despite superhuman resistance, was dragged to the back of the hall. The initiated one saw him wrestling and writhing in the torturers' hands and heard his voice hissing past the gag. A poniard flashed in the lamplight like lightning, and after it fell, with a slapping sound of the hilt, the dead body landed heavily on the stone floor.
"Justice has been executed," observed the stranger, turning round to the terrifying circle, whose greedy eyes had gazed on him out of their grave clothes.
"So you approve of the execution?"
"Yes, if the slain were truly guilty."
"And would you drink the downfall of any one who sold the secrets of this Ancient Association?"
"In any beverage."
"Bring hither the cup," said the arch-officer.
One of the two executioners drew near with a skull brimming with a warm and ruddy liquid. The stranger took the goblet by its brass stem and said, as he held it up: "I drink to the death of all false brothers." Lowering the cup to his lips, he drained it to the last drop, and calmly returned it to the giver.
A murmur of astonishment ran around the assemblage, as the phantoms glanced at one another.