The effect was instantaneous. With a sharp cry of rage the patroon caught up his sword. He lunged forward before either of us had a moment to think what he was doing, and passed the sharp blade clean through the body of the dwarf. Louis toppled forward across the table without uttering a sound. The glasses shattered with a crash, and the wine from the decanter trickled out and mingled with the blood which I can hear to this day, as it rattled with a sharp sound on the papers which were everywhere about. The patroon stood mopping the sweat from his brow and looking down on the body of his henchman. “Come with me, Vincent, come with me. If what this fellow said is true, I am in a trap indeed. Perhaps the papers are in his room, perhaps he did not write them, but let us see.” We went to Louis’s room and ransacked every corner for some sign of the papers. We sounded the floor for loose boards. We tore open the bedding. We let no nook or cranny escape our vigilance. But nothing rewarded our search. “Well,” muttered Van Volkenberg moodily, “he must have told the truth. Someone else has the papers if they were ever written at all. Who had he for friends?” Then he swore a fearful oath, for he had thought of the Marmadukes. “If she comes against me—” He doubled his fists, but did not finish the sentence. We went back to dispose of the body of Louis. When this was done the patroon prepared to summon the remaining members of the Red Band. I did not know what he wanted of his retainers, nor did I care. I remembered what Louis had said to me about the loose bricks by the oven and that I should look there in case of his death by violence. I resolved to do a little hunting on my own account and, sure enough, when I reached the place, I found two small packets, which I hastily concealed about me and retired to my room. One of the packets was marked “The Great Secret.” The other bore the date of that very day. I tore it open. Here is what I read: “I heard the whole conversation between Van Volkenberg and Captain Kidd. The latter has come here to recruit the crew which is to take the Adventure out to sea to capture pirate ships. Van Volkenberg has agreed to furnish the eighty men needed to complete the crew. The agreement is that as soon as they are well at sea these men are to mutiny. Kidd is to give in without resistance. Then they are all to turn pirates. Van Volkenberg is to get a share of the booty and to start the rumor that this was Bellamont’s intention from the first. There was another plan disclosed” The account stopped abruptly, without even the formality of a period. Louis may have been interrupted in his writing and found no chance to finish, or he may have thought better and decided not to tell all he knew. Of this fact, of course, no one will ever know. I was about to break the seal of the second packet and read the Great Secret, when I heard steps in the corridor on the way to my door. The next moment there was a knock.