"Yes, yes," eagerly cried the spy. "Spare me, spare me, and I will tell you everything. Three members of the police force were appointed to follow, in a carriage, the vehicle that brought me here. They were to wait about until the meeting broke up and then shadow the tallest man and a crook-necked man to their lodgings and identify them. They are now waiting in the dark shadows of the warehouse." "Did you have any signal agreed upon with them?" asked the cripple. "Yes," the wretch replied, conscious that he was giving up his associates to certain death, but willing to sacrifice the whole world if he might save his own life. "Spare me, spare me, and I win tell you all." "Proceed," said the cripple. "I would not trust myself to be known by them. I agreed with Prince Cabano upon a signal between us. I am to come to them, if I need their help, and say: 'Good evening, what time is it?' The reply is, 'It is thieves' time.' Then I am to say, 'The more the better;' and they are to follow me." "Richard," said the cripple, "did you hear that?" "Yes." "Take six men with you; leave them in the brew-house cellar; lead the police thither; throw the bodies in the river." The man called Richard withdrew, with his men, to his work of murder. The prisoner rolled his eyes appealingly around that dreadful circle. "Spare me!" he cried. "I know the secrets of the banks. I can lead you into the Prince of Cabano's house. Do not kill me. "Is that all?" asked the giant. "Yes," replied the cripple. In an instant the huge man, like some beast that had been long held back from its prey, gave a leap forward, his face revealing terrible ferocity; it was a tiger that glares, plunges and devours. I saw something shining, brilliant and instantaneous as an electric flash; then there was the sound of a heavy blow. The spy sprang clean out of the hands that were holding him, high up in the air; and fell, close to me, stone dead. He had been dead, indeed, when he made that fearful leap. His heart was split in twain. His spring was not the act of the man; it was the protest of the body against the rush of the departing spirit; it was the clay striving to hold on to the soul. The giant stooped and wiped his bloody knife upon the clothes of the dead man. The cripple laughed a crackling, hideous laugh. I hope God will never permit me to hear such a laugh again. Others took it up--it echoed all around the room. I could think of nothing but the cachinnations of the fiends as the black gates burst open and new hordes of souls are flung, startled and shrieking, into hell. "Thus die all the enemies of the Brotherhood!" cried the thin voice of the cripple. And long and loud they shouted. "Remove the body through the back door," said the giant, "and throw it into the river." "Search his clothes first," said the cripple.