master--we left them with
their faces in the mud, Stefani; in the mud! And the women begged. Fine
music! Those proud hearts, begging Boris Karlov for their lives--their
faces in the mud! You, born of us in those Astrakhan Hills, you denied
us because you liked your fiddle and a full belly, and to play keeper
of those emeralds. The winding paths of torture and misery and death
by which they came into the possession of that house! And always the
proletariat has had to pay in blood and daughters. You, of the people,
to betray us!"

"I did not betray you. I only tried to save those who had been kind to
me."

A cunning light shot into Karlov's eyes. "The emeralds!" He struck his
pocket. "Here, Stefani; and they shall be broken up to buy bread for our
people."

"That poor boy! So he brought them! What are you going to do with me?"

"Watch you grow thin, Stefani. You want death; you shall want food
instead. Oh, a little; enough to keep you alive. You must learn what it
is to be hungry."

The squat man picked up the bundle from the table and tore off the
wrapping paper. A violin the colour of old Burgundy lay revealed.

"Boris!" The man in the chair writhed.

"Have I waked you, Stefani?"--tenderly. "The Stradivarius--the very
grand duke of fiddles! And he and his damned officers, how they used to
call out--'Get Stefani to fiddle for us!' And you fiddled, dragged your
genius though the mud to keep your belly warm!"

"To save a soul, Boris--the boy's. When I fiddled his uncle forgot
to drag him into an orgy. Ah, yes; I fiddled, fiddled because I had
promised his mother!"

"The Italian singer! She was lucky to die when she did. She did not see
the torch, the bayonet, and the mud. But the boy did--with his English
accent! How he escaped I don't know; but he died to-night, and the
emeralds are in my pocket. See!" Karlov held the instrument close to
the other's face. "Look at it well, this grand duke of fiddles. Look,
fiddler, look!"

The huge hands pressed suddenly. There was brittle crackling, and a rare
violin became kindling. A sob broke from the prisoner's lips. What
to Karlov was a fiddle to him was a soul. He saw the madman fling the
wreckage to the floor and grind his heels into the fragments. Gregor
shut his eyes, but he could not shut his ears; and he sensed in that
cold, demoniacal fury of the crunching heel the rising of maddened
peoples.

CHAPTER X

Meanwhile, Captain Harrison of the Medical Corps