LAND & WATER 
December 14, 1916 
{Conlinued from page 22) 
Mastering himself at last, Essar^ said: 
' You shall join me, Coralie. Whether you like it or not, 
I am your husband. You felt it just n()w. when the lust to 
murder me made you take pp a weapon and kft you without 
the courage to carry out your intention. It will always be 
hke that. Your independent fit will pass away and you will 
join the man who is your master." 
" I shall remain behind to fight against you," she replied, 
" here, in this house. The work of treason which you have 
accompUshed I shall destroy. I shall do it without hatred. 
(or 1 am no longer capable of hatred, but I shall do it without 
intermission, to repair the evil wliich you have wrought." 
He answered, in a low voice : 
" I am capable of hatred. Beware, Coralie. The very 
moment when you believe that you have nothing more to 
fear will perhaps be the moment when I slnill call you to 
account. Take care." 
He pushed an electric bell. Old Simeon appeared. 
" So the two men-servants have decamped ? " asked 
Essarfe. And, without waiting for the answer, he went on. 
" A good riddance. The housemaid and the cook can do all 
I want. They heard nothing, did they ? No, their bedroom 
is too far away. No matter, Simeon, you must keep a watch 
on them after I am gone." 
He looked at his wife, surprised to see her still there, and 
said to his secretary : 
" Imust be up at six to get everything ready ; and I am 
dead tired. Take me to my room. You can come back and 
put out the lights afterwards." 
He went out, supported by Sim<^on. Patrice Belval at 
once perceived that Coralie had done her best to show no 
weakness in her husband's presence, but that she had come 
to the end of her strength and was unable to walk. Seized 
with faintness, she fell on her knees, making the sign of the 
cross. 
When she was able to rise, a few minutes later, she saw on 
the carpet, between her and the door, a sheet of note-paper 
with her name on it. She picked it up and read : 
" Little Mother Coralie, the struggle is too much for you. 
Why not appeal, to me, your friend? Give a signal and I 
am with you." 
She staggered, dazed by the discovery of the letter and dis- 
mayed by Belval 's daring. But, making a last effort to 
summon up her power of will, she left the room, without 
giving the signal for which Patrice was longing. 
CHAPTER VI 
Nineteen Minutes Past Seven 
PATRICE, in his bedroom at the home, was unable 
to sleep that night. He had a continual waking sen- 
sation of being oppressed and hunted down, as though 
he were suffering the terrors of some monstrous 
nightmare. He had an impression that the frantic series of 
events in which he was playing the combined parts of a be- 
wildered spectator and a helpless actor would never cease 
so long as he tried to rest ; that, on the contrary, they would 
rage with a greater violence and intensity. The leave-taking 
of the husband and wife did not put an end, even moment- 
arily, to the dangers incurred by Coralie. Fresh perils arose 
on every side ; and Patrice Belval confessed himself incapable 
of foreseeing and still more of allaying them. 
After lying awake for two hours, he switched on his electric 
kght and began hurriedly to write down the story of the past 
twelve hours. He hoped in this way to some small extent 
t« unravel the tangled knot. 
At six o'clock he went and roused Ya-Bon and brought him 
back with him. Then, standing in front of the astonished 
■egro, he crossed his arms and exclaimed : 
" So you consider that your job is over ! While I lie tossing 
about in the dark, my lord sleeps and all's well 1 My dear 
man, you have a jolly elastic conscience.'.' 
The word elastic amused the Senegalese mightily. His 
Mouth opened wider than ever ; and he gave a grunt of 
anjoyment. 
"That'll do, that'll do," said the captain. "There's 
■o getting a word in, once you start talking. Here, 
take a chair, read this report and give me your reasoned 
opinion. WTiat ? You don't know how to read ? Well 
upon my word ! What was the good, then, of wearing out 
the seat of your trousers on the benches of the Senegal 
schools and colleges ? A queer education, I must say ! " 
He heaved a sigh and, snatching the manuscript, said : 
" Listen, reflect, argue, deduct and conclude. This is 
how the matter briefly stands. First, we have one Essarfes 
Bey, a banker, rich as Croesus, and the lowest of rapscallions, 
who betrays at one and the same time France, Egypt, England, 
Turkey, Bulgaria and Greece . . . as is proved by the 
fact that his accomplices roast his feet for him. Thereupon 
he kills one of them and gets rid of four with the aid of as 
many millions, which millions he orders another accomplice 
to get back for him before five minutes are passed. And all 
these bright spirits will duck underground at eleven o'clock 
this morning, lor at twelve o'clock the pohce propose to enter 
on the scene. Good." 
Patrice Belval paused to take breath and continued : 
" Secondly, "Little Mother Coralie— upon my word, I can't 
say why— is married to Rapscallion Bey. She hates him 
and wants to kill him. He loves her and wants to kill her. ^ 
There is also a colonel who loves her and for that reason 
loses his life and a certain Mustapha, who tries to kidnap 
her on the colonel's account and also loses his hfe for that 
reason, strangled by a Senegalese. Lastly, there is a French 
captain, a dot-and-carry-one, who likewise loves her, but 
whom she avoids because she is married to a man whom she 
abhors. And with this Captain, in a previous incarnation, 
she has halved an amethyst bead. Add to all this, by way of 
accessories, a rusty key, a red-silk bowstring, a dog choked 
to death and a grate filled with red coals. And, if you dare 
to understand a single word of my explanation, I'll catch you 
a \vhack with my wooden leg, for I don't understand it a httle 
bit and I'm your captain." 
Ya-Bon laughed all over his mouth and all over the gaping 
scar that cut one of his cheeks in two. As ordered by his 
captain, he understood nothing of the business and very little 
of what Patrice had said ; but he always quivered with de- 
light when Patrice addressed him in that gruff tone. 
" That's enough," said the captain. " It's my turn now to 
argue, deduct and conclude." 
He leant against the mantelpiece, with his two elbows 
on the marble shelf and his head tight-pressed between his 
hands. His merriment, which sprang from temperamental 
lightness of heart, was this time only a surface merriment. 
Deep down within himself he did nothing but think of Coralie 
with sorrowful apprehension. What could he do to protect 
her ? A number of plans occurred to him : which was he to 
choose ? Should he hunt through the numbers in the tele- 
phone book till he hit upon the whereabouts of that Gregoire, 
with whom Bournef and his companions had taken refuge ? 
Should he inform the police ? Should he return to the Rue 
Raynoiard? He did not know. Yes, he was capable of acting, 
if the act to be performed consisted in flinging himself into the 
conflict with furious ardour. But to prepare the action, to 
divine the obstacles, to rend the darkness and, as he said, 
to see the invisible and grasp the intangible, tl.at was beyond 
his power. 
He turned suddenly to Ya-Bon, who was standing depressed 
by his silence : 
What's the matter with you, putting on that lugubrious 
air? Of course it's you that throws a gloom over me ! You 
always look at the black side of things . . . Uke a nigger I 
. . . Be off." 
Ya-Bon was going away discomfited when some one tapped 
at the door and a voice said : 
" Captain Belval, you're wanted on the telephone." 
Patrice hurried out. Who on earth could be telephoning to 
him so early in the morning ? 
" Who is it ? " he asked the nurse. 
" I don't know captain . . . It's a man's voice ; he 
seemed to want you urgently. The bell had been ringing some 
time. I was downstairs, in the kitchen . . ." 
Before Patrice's eyes there rose a vision of the telephone 
in the Rue Raynouard, in the big room at the Essarte' house. 
He could not help wondering if there was anything to connect 
the two incidents. 
He went down one flight of stairs and along a passage. 
The telephone was through a small waiting-room, in a room 
that had been turned into a hnen closet. He closed the 
door behind him. 
" Hullo ! Captain Belval speaking. What is it ? " 
A voice, a man's voice which he did not know, replied in 
breathless, panting tones : 
"Ah I . . . Captain Belval ! . . . It's you 1 
Look here . . . but I'm almost afraid that it's too 
late ... I don't know if I shall have time to finish 
. . . Did you get the key and the letter ? . . ." 
" Who are you ? " asked Patrice. 
" Did you get the key and the letter ? " the voice insisted. 
" The key, yes, " Patrice replied, " but not the letter." 
" Not the letter ? But this is terrible ! Then you don't 
know . . ." 
A hoarse cry struck Patrice's ear and the next thing he 
caught was incoherent sounds at the other end of the wire, 
the noise of an altercation. Then the voice seemed to glue 
itself to the instrument and he distinctly heard it gasping. 
{To be conlinued) 
