"Keep back!" he cried shrilly. "You have trapped me, but I fight--yes, I fight." Jarman maintained his seat and smoked coolly. "There's no need for you to fight, man," he said soothingly. "Should I know about the Scarlet Bat and that letter if I were not Mr. Lancaster's friend?" "Others know, and they are not friends," said the negro, doubtfully, but lowering the revolver. "Captain Banjo Berry and his niece?" "Huh!" Tamaroo grunted in true nigger fashion. "You know them?" "Rather," replied Jarman, flinging himself back. "And I know much more about them than they like. They got poor Lancaster into this trouble." Tamaroo groaned. "I know it," he said, "and if I had only come to England sooner it would not have happened. I arrived just after the trouble, and heard that my young master was accused." "You do not believe him guilty, then, Tamaroo?" "No, sir. Certainly I do not. Captain Berry came to England to try and get my young master hanged." "For what reason?" asked Eustace, wondering to find his suspicions verified. "I always thought he did; but why?" Tamaroo touched his breast-pocket. "That is told here," he said, "but I cannot speak save to my master." "But I am his friend. I may as well tell you that after he got into trouble he came to me. He stopped for a time, then, being in danger of discovery, he fled." "You do not know where he is?" asked the negro, disappointed. Eustace looked at him keenly. "Well I do," he admitted, "but he is in such danger that I dare not tell. Can't I see the papers?" Tamaroo moved towards the door. "No, sir," he said sternly; "my old master told me to read them and to give them to Mr. Lancaster alone. Oh! tell me where he is, I beg you, sir?" Eustace looked perplexed. He had no reason on the face of it to doubt the good faith of the man, and the sealed letter being answered in this way was a guarantee that Tamaroo was the emissary of the elder Lancaster. But it behoved him to be cautious, as he was surrounded on all sides by snares and pitfalls. Captain Berry was not the man to stop short of any crime to gain his end--witness the death of Starth and his pursuit of Frank. "Do you know why Berry is pursuing Lancaster?" he asked, forgetting that the negro might see fit to keep his own counsel for the same reasons. "To get him hanged to said Tamaroo, quietly. "You said that before. But the reason?" In his turn Tamaroo replied: "You said that before, sir. It is in the papers which I carry." "And they will explain the whole business?" "They will. They contain the whole story of the Scarlet Bat and of the Indian treasure--" "Ah!" interpolated Eustace with grim satisfaction. "I knew there was a treasure. How much, Tamaroo? A million?" "Nearly that. But you can see from the will." "The will! Have you the will of Mr. Lancaster?" Tamaroo nodded. "I have the will." "And is Mr. Lancaster the elder dead?"