“What are the terms?” doubtingly inquired the doomed man.
“Will you accept them?”
“I will not become a murderer and a thief!” was the fierce retort. “I will not plunder and slay, and give one-half my evil gain to those criminals who hide their faces and are growing wealthy through the black crimes other men commit out of fear of them. I am a man! My ancestors were of the Castellani—the aristocrats of the red hoods. Never one of them has descended to the ranks of crime. It is because of that thing that I am now condemned to the assassin. The Ten claim they are the descendants of the black-hooded Nicolletti, and that they are avenging the old wrongs of their class. It is a lie! They are thieves and murderers, banded together for plunder. They strike no blows with their own hands, but they frighten others into doing the dark work and giving them half the plunder. Not even their tools know who compose the Ten, whose faces are always hidden. No man dares betray them by confessing. If he is caught red-handed, he takes all the blame, and tells it not that those who drove him to his crimes, and have shared his plunder, are the Ten, for if he should speak, he knows the ban of death will fall on all his family and all his blood relations.”
Repeatedly the stranger had tried to check the torrent of words flowing from Reggie’s lips, but his efforts had been unavailing. The speaker was aroused to a pitch of desperation, and he would not be silenced until he had finished.
“I fear not to speak!” he exclaimed. “I know I must die, for I have received the iron ring.”
“You fool!” hissed the other. “Do you not think of Teresa? What will happen to her if you talk like this?”
Reggie’s aspect of defiant rage suddenly departed, his shoulders drooped and he lifted his shaking hand to his eyes.
“Teresa!” he whispered. “Teresa, my sister! What have I done?”
“You have spoken like a crazy fool in the presence of foreigners,” declared the other man. “Still, besides them, I am the only one who has heard your words, and I am your friend. Their lips must be silenced, for if they speak one word of this, Teresa is doomed!”
Once more Reggio straightened himself somewhat defiantly.