breathless haste
groped his way down the narrow, ladderlike steps. He felt himself an
avenging, punishing power, like the Nemesis who had pursued him in his
dreams. He must wrest the friend who was to him the most beloved of
mortals from the rioters. To defeat them himself seemed a small matter.
His shout--"I am coming, Myrtilus! Snuphis, Bias, Dorcas, Syrus! here,
follow me!" was to summon the old Egyptian doorkeeper and the slaves,
and inform his friend of the approach of a deliverer.

The loudest uproar echoed from his own studio. Its door stood wide open,
and black smoke, mingled with the deep red and yellow flames of burning
pitch, poured from it toward him.

"Myrtilus!" he shouted at the top of his voice as he leaped across the
threshold into the tumult which filled the spacious apartment, at the
same time clashing the heavy iron anchor down upon the head of the
broad-shouldered, half-naked fellow who was raising a clumsy lance
against him.

The pirate fell as though struck by lightning, and he again shouted
"Myrtilus!" into the big room, so familiar to him, where the conflict
was raging chaotically amid a savage clamour, and the smoke did not
allow him to distinguish a single individual.

For the second time he swung the terrible weapon, and it struck to the
floor the monster with a blackened face who had rushed toward him, but
at the same time the anchor broke in two.

Only a short metal rod remained in his hand, and, while he raised his
arm, determined to crush the temples of the giant carrying a torch who
sprang forward to meet him, it suddenly seemed as if a vulture with
glowing plumage and burning beak was attacking his face, and the
terrible bird of prey was striking its hard, sharp, red-hot talons more
and more furiously into his lips, cheeks, and eyes.

At first a glare as bright as sunshine had flashed before his gaze;
then, where he had just seen figures and things half veiled by the
smoke, he beheld only a scarlet surface, which changed to a violet, and
finally a black spot, followed by a violet-blue one, while the vulture
continued to rend his face with beak and talons.

Then the name "Myrtilus!" once more escaped his lips; this time,
however, it did not sound like the encouraging shout of an avenging
hero, but the cry for aid of one succumbing to defeat, and it was soon
followed by a succession of frantic outbursts of suffering, terror, and
despair.

But now sharp whistles from the water sh