Cornered like a rat, yet viciously resolute to the last, Kilgore had, in order to make his escape, resorted to a means from which a less cool and nervy scoundrel would have shrunk on such a night as that. He had, by reaching far out of the window, been able to grasp an old-fashioned lightning rod with which the ancient wooden mansion was provided, and by which he proposed to descend to the ground. Under the swindler's weight, the beating of this swaying rod against the side of the house was the sound Nick had heard. Kilgore, whose courage was worthy a far better cause, already was halfway to the ground. Yet Nick had no idea of letting the knave escape thus, and he raised his weapon to fire. There was no need for a bullet, however, for the hand of the Almighty did the work. From the black vault of the heavens a bolt of liquid fire suddenly shot earthward, with a crash of thunder that seemed to rend the entire firmament. The fiery bolt reached the earth--but it reached it through the rod to which Dave Kilgore was desperately clinging. Not a sound came from the doomed man as he went down--or if there was a sound, it was drowned by the deafening crash and successive reverberations of thunder. Before Nick had fairly recovered from the blinding light and terrific concussion, he heard the voice of Chick yelling loudly from below: "Nick, Nick, come down here! The house is afire. The whole house is afire!" Nick heard and darted for the stairs, at once realizing how well the lightning had done its terrific work. Before he could reach the lower hall, dense volumes of smoke were pouring through the house, and one entire side of the fated dwelling was in flames. Nick thought of the woman in the cellar below, and, with Chick and Patsy at his heels, he led the way to the diamond plant. The electric light had been extinguished by the lightning stroke, but Nick soon located the body of Cervera, and together the detectives brought her out and laid her upon the ground some rods away from the burning dwelling. "She's done for, poor wretch!" muttered Nick, as he looked at her bloodless face. He was right. Señora Cervera had danced her last dance--a terrible one it was! She had lapsed into a merciful unconsciousness, from which she never emerged. Next came Kilgore, and they easily found him. He lay stretched upon the ground, dead and scorched almost beyond recognition, at the base of the metallic rod through which he had met his fate. "Lend a hand here," said Nick. "We'll place him with his confederate until we can have them properly removed." "So be it," said Chick, gravely. "It's about the last we can do for them, and this nearly ends our work on this job." "You've got the others?" "Every man of them." "Well done!" nodded Nick, as they raised the lifeless form between them. "Behold the way of the transgressor." "Hark!" exclaimed Patsy. "There goes the fire alarm. In three minutes there'll be a mob about here."