Page:Vance--The false faces.djvu/119

Rh "you can't possibly be so unreasonable! I tell you, I haven't got your damned paper!"

A loop of the handkerchief slipped over one hand.

"Be still! Cease your struggles. And not so loud, my friend!" The peremptory voice dropped into mockery as Lanyard, pale and exhausted, sat back trembling—and a second loop of silk dropped over the other hand. "So you begin to appreciate that we mean business, yes? One minute and thirty seconds!"

"Have mercy!" the adventurer whined desperately—and licked his lips as if he found them dry with fear. Now both hands were all but wholly free. True: he remained blindfolded and covered by a deadly weapon. "Give me a chance. I'll do anything you wish! But I can't give you what I haven't got."

"Be silent! Here, Karl."

There was a sound of unintelligible murmuring as the two spies conferred together. Lanyard writhed in apparent extremity of terror. His hands were free. He sought hopelessly for inspiration. What to do without arms?

"Be grateful to Karl. He urges that perhaps you know nothing of the document."

"Don't you think I'd tell if I did know?"

"Then you have one minute—no, forty seconds—in which to pledge yourself to the Prussian Secret Service."

"You want me to swear?"

"Certainly."

"Then hear me," said Lanyard earnestly: "You damned canaille!" And in one movement he tore the bandage