“What is your name?” was the first question of the master of the situation, who, noticing the other’s shrug and hesitation, added: “You needn’t pretend you don’t understand me. What is your name, I repeat?”
“Alessandro Pierotti,” was the answer.
“Who was the man that was blown into the wood behind me?”
“Giuseppe Caprioni.”
To test the truthfulness of the fellow Detective Pendar now demanded the name of the other member of the group that had loitered during the last few days about the hotel in Chesterton. Pierotti gave it correctly, and his questioner was convinced that all were right.
“That makes three. Who were the others connected with you?”
“No more,—that all.”
The detective did not believe this, aware as he was of the fearful penalties that are visited by members of the Black Hand upon those who betray their associates. He wondered in fact why Pierotti had not tried to deceive him as to the names. It may have been because he believed the truth was at the command of this captor. That others were connected with his crime was a certainty, but this was not the time nor place in which to probe the matter.
“How long did you have the little girl in this part of the country?”
The frightened prisoner wrinkled his brow in thought.