“Together, then, you shall die! I have made a vow! A Turk always keeps his word.”
“Pardon me, but I’m afraid you lie, pasha,” says Wycherley, as he strikes the yataghan out of Scutari’s hand with a cudgel he picks up from the floor. Then as he places his foot upon the weapon, he continues calmly: “My dear man, don’t you know the race isn’t always to the swift? When you come to America and buck against Chicago brain and muscle it’s ten to one you go home a sadder and a wiser man. That’s right, scowl as you please, I’m quite impervious to it. Now you feel for another weapon and start for me! Well, I’m cheerfully on deck, every time. Come on with your circus, band-wagon and all. The show has begun and I am ready to play my part.”
With considerable adroitness the ex-actor has whipped out his bowie, and the other hand withdraws the revolver that Wild Bill once handled. Such a display might well cause dismay even in the breast of a fire-eater, and perhaps the Turk might have paused before rushing to impale himself, but the detective in woman’s clothes, feeling that he is expected to do something more in order to earn his fat fee, now fastens upon the back of the pasha, just as the Old Man of the Sea did upon Sinbad, and, pinioning his arms to his sides, despite his mad bellowings, prevents him from either flight or any dangerous move.
Anthony Wayne turns to fly, but Aleck gives him a whirl that sends him into a corner. The three Turkish adherents of the pasha have already dashed from the room by means of the other exit.
Another scene is taking place on the right. Dorothy has left Aleck’s side. Straight as an arrow in its flight she passes to the woman still kneeling at Samson’s feet. She bends, she places her arms about Marda’s neck, and into her ear she sobs:
“Oh, my mother, my mother!”
The woman snatches her in a fierce embrace. Cheated by a cruel fate all these long years, still the mother-love for its child has remained within her heart, and now asserts its power.
Samson Cereal cannot gaze upon the spectacle without deep emotion. Strange indeed that two specters of his early life should thus be resurrected so close together. It is true that our destiny is often molded by unseen hands.
Aleck goes over and takes hold of the valet who has played his master false. He brings him to the speculator, cowering and trembling.
“Turn him around—so. I only want one kick at the dog that could bite the hand which has fed him. Now, go, and never let me see your face again, you base wretch!”