"I don't know--I can't say!" interrupted his master, impatiently. "Go and get the men to bring down a stretcher for the body, and send the groom for Dr. Etwald." "Ain't it too late, sir?" "Do as I tell you," said Jen, so fiercely that Jaggard did not dare to disobey, but ran off, leaving the major alone with his dead. The road which ran past "Ashantee" toward The Wigwam was lonely even in the daytime, and at this hour of the night--for it was close upon nine o'clock--it was quite deserted. Not a person was in sight, although the major could see up and down the road for a considerable distance, owing to the bright moonlight. He raised Maurice--or rather all that remained of Maurice--in his arms, and placed the body on the soft grass by the wayside. Then he sat down and began to think out the reason for the committal of this cowardly crime. That it was a crime he was certain, for there was no reasonable idea to suppose that Maurice had committed suicide. He had left for Deanminster hardly three hours before, full of health and spirits; and now he was dead. A dead body, a lonely road--all the evidence of an atrocious assassination having been committed, and not one trace of the assassin. Undoubtedly the twice-uttered cry had come from Maurice, and as Jen had raced out of the house after the first time he heard it, he must have reached his boy almost immediately after he died; before, so to speak, the body had time to grow cold. Yet the strange part of the affair was that the body was cold, and that there did not seem to be any wound whereby the murder could have been achieved. "I am taking too much for granted," muttered Major Jen, passing his hand across his brow, "Maurice may not have been killed after all. It is Etwald and his horrible prophecies which have put the idea into my head. Let me have a look at the poor lad's body." In the bright moonlight he carefully examined the body, but could find no trace of any wound, until he came to the right hand. Here, in the palm, he saw a ragged rent clotted with blood, but it was a mere scratch not likely to have caused death, unless poison were--. Here Major Jen uttered an oath, and rose to his feet with a new and terrible idea in his brain. "The devil-stick, by heaven!" he said aloud. Again he bent down and examined the face and hands. Both were swollen and discolored; he tore open the shirt at the neck, and saw that the young man's breast was all distended and bloated. Undoubtedly the cause of death was blood-poisoning, and the devil-stick had been the instrument used to effect the deed. But here the problem proposed itself: Who had killed Maurice? The person who had stolen the devil-stick! Who had stolen the devil-stick? The person who--Major Jen came to an abrupt pause. He could think for the moment of no answer to that question; but it is only fair to say that, dazed by the terrible occurrence of his dear lad's death, Jen had not his wits about him.