f his
powerful arm, made his way into the front rank. Arnold clutched at
him.

"Don't go," he begged. "It isn't worth while. You hear, he has shot
three policemen already. You can't save him--you can't help him."

Sabatini turned round with an air of gentle superiority.

"My young friend," he said, "do you not understand that Isaac will
not be taken alive? There is a question I must ask him before he
dies."

The inspector stepped forward--afterwards he said that it was for
the purpose of stopping Sabatini. He was too late, however. The
crowd thronging the end of the street, and the hundreds of people
who peered from the windows, had a moment of wonderful excitement.
One could almost hear the thrill which stirred from their throats.
Across the empty street, straight towards the window behind which
the doomed man lay, Sabatini walked, strangest of figures amidst
those sordid surroundings, in his evening clothes, thin black
overcoat, and glossy silk hat. Step by step he approached the door.
He was about three yards from the curbstone when the window behind
which Isaac was crouching was suddenly smashed, and Isaac leaned
out. The crowd, listening intently, could hear the crash of falling
glass upon the pavement. They had their view of Isaac, too--a wan,
ghostlike figure, with haggard cheeks and staring eyes, eyes which
blazed out from between the strands of black hair.

"Stand where you are," he shouted, and the people who watched saw
the glitter of the setting sun upon the pistol in his hand. Sabatini
looked up.

"Isaac Lalonde," he called out, "you know who I am?"

"I know who you are," they heard him growl,--"Count Sabatini,
Marquis de Lossa, Chevalier de St. Jerome, Knight of the Holy Roman
Empire, aristocrat, blood-sucker of the people."

Sabatini shrugged his shoulders slightly.

"As to that," he answered firmly, "one may have opinions. My hand at
least is free from bloodshed. You are there with nothing but death
before you. I am here to ask a question."

"Ask it, then," the man at the window muttered. "Can't you see that
the time is short?"

"Is it true, this message which you sent me by that young man? Is it
my daughter, the child of Cecile, whom you have kept from me all
these years?"

Isaac leaned further forward out of the window. Every one in the
crowd could see him now. There were a few who began to shout. Every
one save Sabatini himself seemed conscious of his danger. Sabatini,
heedless or un