"Then he saw us. We knew that he had no weapon. The door we barred. Then Voski, he sit down and light a cigar, smiling, smiling all the time. When we look at him we see that he moves not so much as a little finger. There was no sign of fear, except that he look at a little box on the table now and then." "Ah," the princess cried. "You got it, eh?" Ben Heer made no direct reply. He was not to be hurried. He meant to describe a sordid murder in his own cold-blooded way. Probably he did not regard the thing as a crime at all; he had been acting under the blessing of the priests. "'You have come for it?' he asked. "We bowed low with respect, saying that we had come for it. He lay back in his chair, making a sign for me to approach. Previously we had told him that it was useless for him to call out to the servants." "You did not tell those servants their fortunes in your present garb?" "No, no, my mistress. We no such pigs as that.... Sahib Voski bid me approach. My friend had the 'pi' ready on the cloth.... It was held to the head of the other. And so he died peacefully in his chair." "Ah, so you say. Where are your proofs?" Ben Heer slowly withdrew a white packet from the folds of his dress. "What better proof could the slave of my illustrious mistress have?" he asked. "It is here--the precious stone with the secrets of the gods written on it. Behold!" With a slightly dramatic gesture a glittering fragment of something that looked like green jade was held on high. The princess grasped it eagerly and devoured it with her eyes. Words were pouring in a liquid stream from her lips; she was transformed almost beyond recognition. "At last," she murmured, "at last! But the other one--your companion. How did he die? You say he is dead. How?" Ben Heer shook his head sadly. "I cannot say," he replied. "It might have been some scheme on the part of Sahib Voski. When we got back to our room in London we were both dreadfully ill. For days I lie, and when I get better they tell me my poor friend is dead and buried. "Then I understood why Voski Sahib smile and smile in that strange way. It was witchcraft, perhaps, or some devil we do not know in the East--but there is the stone." The princess was regarding the shining stone with a besotted enthusiasm that seemed grotesquely out of place with her dress and surroundings. Perhaps this suddenly flashed upon her, for she carefully locked up the stone. "You have done well, Ben Heer," she said, "and shall not go unrewarded. The worst part of our task is over, the rest is easy." "Then the princess goes not back to Lassa?" Ben Heer asked. "Oh, not yet, not yet. Not till they are destroyed, root and branch to the smallest twig on the tree. I have not spared myself and I am not going to spare others. Yet there remain those of the accursed race yonder, the Ravenspurs. They know too much, they have that which I require. I will kill them off--they shall die----"