We continued to ascend the path, dragging the Lala between us. He had little chance of escape between two such men as we, and he seemed to know it, for after a few minutes he submitted quietly enough. At last we reached an open space among the rocks and trees, and Balsamides stopped. We were quite out of earshot from the road, and it would be hard to imagine a more desolate place than it appeared, between two and three o'clock on that March night, the bare twigs of the birch-trees wriggling in the bleak wind, the faint light of the decrescent moon, that seemed to be upside down in the sky, falling on the white rocks, and on the whitened branches torn down by the winter's storms, lying like bleached bones upon the ground before us.
"Now," said Balsamides to the negro, "no one can hear us. You have one chance of life. Tell us at once where we can find the Russian Effendi whose property you stole and sold to Marchetto in the bazaar."
In the dim gloom I almost fancied that the black man changed color as Gregorios put this question, but he answered coolly enough.
"You cannot find him," he said. "You need not have brought me here to ask me about him. I would have told you what you wanted to know at Yeni Köj, willingly enough."
"Why can he not be found?"
"Because he has been dead nearly two years, and his body was thrown into the Bosphorus," answered the Lala defiantly.
"You killed him, I suppose?" Balsamides tightened his grip upon the man's arm. But Selim was ready with his reply.
"You need not tear me in pieces. He killed himself."
The news was so unexpected that Balsamides and I both started and looked at each other. The Lala spoke with the greatest decision.
"How did he kill himself?" asked Gregorios sternly.