“I know that you took away the box with the asp this evening,” Wilson went on, “I said nothing for I believed that you had done it for a mere joke to alarm me over the loss of my deadly pet. But this horrible _eclaircissement_ to-night has taught me better. You deliberately laid your plans for the death of Talbot Strangemore, whom you both hate and fear for some unexplained cause. Do you dare deny your murderous attempt?” “I dare deny it because I am innocent. I had no cause of quarrel with Strangemore. He was my friend,” asserted Ferris boldly, yet inwardly quaking with fear. “You are a liar!” Wilson cried stormily, and one after another the voices of the men caught it up and the fierce accusation rang out upon the air. Someone ran and brought Strangemore and placed them face to face. The would-be murderer recoiled with a cry of fear when he beheld his living foe. “Strangemore, I thought you dead!” he exclaimed, and the other answered, with limitless contempt: “It is not your fault that I am alive!” “Speak, Strangemore,” cried the leader. “Do you believe that this coward and villain quaking here, placed that serpent in your bed with the deliberate intention of destroying you?” There was a moment of the deepest, most intense silence, and then Talbot Strangemore lifting his hand solemnly to heaven, answered firmly: “Before God I believe it.” “That is enough,” said the spokesman, and he turned back to Ferris who had broken into fierce denials and imprecations. “Listen,” he said. “In your own land they have a terrible and summary method of punishing offenders such as you are--men guilty of the blackest treason and iniquity. I confess that in your case I could contemplate that method with unalloyed satisfaction. I see no reason why we foreigners here under the distant skies of Egypt should not have recourse to American methods to punish this native of a land which he has dishonored. My comrades, what say you? Shall we not resolve ourselves into a court of Judge Lynch?” “Aye, aye,” the answer rang loudly, with but two dissenting voices, and those two the would-be murderer’s and his noble victim. But in the next moment the exciting scene came to an abrupt pause by a sudden interruption. “Ho, ho, ho!” rang two blended voices, startling the actors in the drama being played, and looking quickly around they confronted two strong men who had stolen unobserved upon them. “What, John Armstrong and his servant!” they cried, and forgetting Ferris and his sin for a moment, they gathered around the new comer plying him with eager questions. Oswald Ferris drew a long breath of relief and crouched upon the ground by the side of the camp-bed, hoping that the coming of the long expected Armstrong would turn the thoughts of his stern judges in some more kindly direction.