Page:Christopher Wren--the wages of virtue.djvu/305

Rh sort! Who had done it? Certainly not le Légionnaire Bouckaing Bronceau. Never for one second had the Légionnaire Rivoli's back been toward him. Never for one instant had there been a knife in the American's hand. Yet there lay the great Luigi Rivoli stabbed to the heart. There was the knife in his back. Dame!

Men's mouths hung open stupidly, as they stared wide-eyed. Gradually it grew clear and obvious. Of course—he had been knocked backwards into that group of his jackals, Malvin, Borges, Hirsch and Bauer, and one of them, who hated him, had been so excited and uplifted by the sight of his defeat that he had turned upon him. Yes, he had been stabbed by one of those four.

"Malvin did it. I saw him," ejaculated Tant-de-Soif. He honestly thought he had—or thought he thought so. "God bless him," he added solemnly.

He had many a score to settle with M. Malvin, but he could afford to give him generous praise—since he was booked for the firing-party beside the open grave, or five years rabiau in Biribi. It is not every day that one's most hated enemies destroy each other.…

"Wal! I allow thet's torn it," opined the Bucking Bronco as he surveyed his dead enemy.

Carmelita came from behind the bar and down the room. What was happening? Why had the fight stopped? She saw the huddled heap that had been Rivoli.… She saw the knife—and thought she understood. This was as things should be. This was how justice and vengeance were executed in her own beloved Naples. Il Signor Americano was worthy to be a Neapolitan, worthy to inherit and transmit