"If you insist on it, I suppose she wears some twenty years, and a queenly garment they!"
"What! Twenty years in your sight also! Why I tell you this very girl is the one of whom I spoke to you that I loved twenty years ago."
"You lie, by the Father of Lies!"
The bandit clapped his hand to hilt, and as instantly snatched it away.
"I fight with no cripple," he hissed in his teeth, "but you shall hear from herself God's truth!"
So saying he ran his great strength against that door. Twice and thrice he rammed it. It did not flinch. He went back a few steps to acquire a fresh impetus. But before he could return to the attack it flew abruptly open, as if moved by some hidden spring. Iron Haquin uttered an astonished cry. The boudoir was no longer there!
The mysterious chamber had undergone another Protean change. To speak more by the book, there was no longer any chamber. The door framed nothing but blackest darkness. Neither ceiling, nor walls, nor floor could be distinguished. By this time the Bohemian had struggled to his feet, and now hobbled in the direction of the door.
"Back, back," cried the bandit, "this is no place for you, nor for any christened man. The foundations of this house are laid in hell. Back, back, as you value your infinite soul!"
"To heel," shrieked the Bohemian, and he whipped our his sword, "lest I strike you in the place where you live! This is my hour, and you shall not be the only one to take her between your hands."
Before Haquin could forestall him, he had leaped the grinning door, and disappeared in enigmatical gloom. He was scarcely lost to sight, when a shriek rang out, beyond conception awful. It was his death-note. The whole air curdled. Iron Haquin fell upon his knees. What grimmest of riddles the victim solved no man shall ever know. His body—even as his soul—was lost in that abysmal horror. For a while Haquin gazed at it, and saw no sign, nor heard what could be called a sound. It was a grave that gave up no dead.