So she did what a woman of delicate nerves ought to do—she gave a loud, long, piercing shriek, and fainted dead away in her fond husband's arms.
Don Carlos gave a grin, and then pulled at his mustache.
"Another victim," said he to the laughing company. "Oh yes; O'Toole shall certainly swing for this. Discipline must and shall be maintained. Send out and catch the fellow. Have him up here at once."
They sent out and they hunted everywhere, but nowhere could they discover any traces of the brilliant, the festive, the imaginative, the mimetic, the ingenious O'Toole. He was never seen again.
Some say that in the dead of night two figures might have been seen slowly wending their way up the path toward the tower; that the one looked like O'Toole and the other looked like Rita. It may have been so; many things are possible in this evil world; and if so, we must suppose that these two gradually faded away among the mists of cloud-land that always surround a castle in Spain.
CHAPTER LXI. — IN WHICH THERE IS AN END OF MY STORY.
The illustrious host received his guests with large and lavish hospitality. The best that could be afforded by a bounteous commissariat was placed before them. The table was laid, the banquet was spread, and all the company sat down together.
At the head of the table was Don Carlos.