He expected no answer, and I gave him none. There are times when an
Indian is the best company in the world.

Just before we reached the market place we had to pass the mouth of a
narrow lane leading down to the river. The night was very dark, though
the stars still shone through rifts in the ever moving clouds. The
Indian and I walked rapidly on,--my footfalls sounding clear and sharp
on the frosty ground, he as noiseless as a shadow. We had reached the
further side of the lane, when he put forth an arm and plucked from the
blackness a small black figure.

In the middle of the square was kept burning a great brazier filled
with pitched wood. It was the duty of the watch to keep it flaming from
darkness to dawn. We found it freshly heaped with pine, and its red
glare lit a goodly circle. The Indian, pinioning the wrists of his
captive with his own hand of steel, dragged him with us into this circle
of light.

"Looking for simples once more, learned doctor?" I demanded.

He mowed and jabbered, twisting this way and that in the grasp of the
Indian.

"Loose him," I said to the latter, "but let him not come too near you.
Why, worthy doctor, in so wild and threatening a night, when fire is
burning and wine flowing at the guest house, do you choose to crouch
here in the cold and darkness?"

He looked at me with his filmy eyes, and that faint smile that had more
of menace in it than a panther's snarl. "I laid in wait for you, it is
true, noble sir," he said in his thin, dreamy voice, "but it was for
your good. I would give you warning, sir."

He stood with his mean figure bent cringingly forward, and with his hat
in his hand. "A warning, sir," he went ramblingly on. "Maybe a certain
one has made me his enemy. Maybe I cut myself loose from his service.
Maybe I would do him an ill turn. I can tell you a secret, sir." He
lowered his voice and looked around, as if in fear of eavesdroppers.

"In your ear, sir," he said.

I recoiled. "Stand back," I cried, "or you will cull no more simples
this side of hell!"

"Hell!" he answered. "There's no such place. I will not tell my secret
aloud."

"Nicolo the Italian! Nicolo the Poisoner! Nicolo the Black Death! I am
coming for the soul you sold me. There is a hell!"

The thundering voice came from underneath our feet. With a sound that
was not a groan and not a screech, the Italian reeled back against the
heated iron of the brazier. Starting from that fiery contact with