He realized, however, that he was in a predicament—that his position was precarious; for if she should remember—if she should recall the name of Nick Carter as connected with that incident, he knew that his own life would not be worth the snap of a finger, no matter how bravely he might fight, or how many of the foe he should overcome in the contest that would inevitably follow.
For, scattered about in that stronghold in the swamp, there were no less than a hundred of her followers, and there was not one among them who would not kill at her bidding.
She was standing upon the piazza, looking away through the woods, when he came out, and, without turning her head, she said to him:
"Take that chair, and remain there until you have smoked your cigar. The men might take it into their heads to be jealous if you should go among them with it, and they should know that you, a new arrival, had breakfasted with me. I will return in a moment."
She left him then, entering the house; and with no thought of immediate danger in his mind, Nick followed her suggestion, and leaned back in the chair, tilting it against the house, determined to enjoy that smoke to the utmost.
After that it was difficult to tell exactly what did happen.
He remembered afterward that he smoked on in enjoyment of the cigar for some minutes, and that he thought it somewhat rank, notwithstanding the fact that it had the appearance of being of excellent quality.
And then suddenly the cigar flashed, exactly as if there had been three or four grains of gunpowder wrapped in it—and he was instantly conscious of an intensely bitter taste in his mouth.
And then it seemed to him almost as if somebody had struck him, so strange were his sensations—and from that instant memory left him entirely.
The woman had been watching him narrowly from the doorway; she was waiting for that flash from the end of his cigar, and when it came she passed out through the door swiftly, and caught him as he was about to fall from his chair to the floor of the piazza; caught him, and held him, and then deftly raised him to his feet, and half carried him inside the house before anybody—had a person been observant of the scene—could have realized that anything was wrong.