"You will regret what you are doing. I am a person of some quality, and you will be held to a bitter responsibility."
"Very well, I like to hold responsibilities, that will just suit me—hee, hee, hee!"
Having secured and gagged his man our hero slipped forth from the cottage. He looked around for the Italian girl. He did not see her, and he muttered:
"Hang it! I am anchored here; that girl will steal in and release the man." Even as our hero spoke he heard a shrill scream, and it was the voice of a female and not very far distant. He started at a run in the direction from which the scream had come and quickly arrived at a point where he beheld a man struggling with a woman. Oscar dashed forward, the man saw him, released the girl, and our hero saw her fall to the ground. He believed a murder had been committed and he ran past the girl to secure the murderer. The latter proved fleet of foot, and most mysteriously disappeared. He vanished as completely as though he had been suddenly dissolved into air.
"Well, that gets me," he ejaculated, and after standing for some minutes looking in every direction, he returned to where the girl lay. He expected to find her dead, but as our hero approached she rose to her feet.
"Thank heaven!" ejaculated Oscar, "I thought you had been murdered."
"I believe he intended to murder me and he might just as well have succeeded—my life is forfeited now."
"Your life is forfeited?"
"Yes."
"Why do you say that?"