with his face upward, his
crushed body doubled over a boulder; the blood was welling from his
mouth and nostrils, and the open eyes glared ghastly in the white, weird
light. It was a sight to inspire fear in the mind of an ordinary
individual, even in that of a murderer. But it had no effect on this
strange _lusus_ of humanity, whose courage was equal to his cruelty.
Instead of giving the body a wide berth, and scared-like stealing past,
he walked boldly up to it, saying in apostrophe--

"So you're there! Well, you need not blame me, but your luck. If I
hadn't pushed you over, you'd have shot me like a dog, or brained me
with the butt of your gun. Aha! I was too much for you, Mr Monk or
soldier, whichever you were, for you're neither now.

"Just possible," he continued, changing the form of his monologue, "he
may have a purse; the which I'm sure to stand in need of before this
time to-morrow. If without money, his weapons may be of use to me."

With a nimbleness which bespoke him no novice at trying pockets, he soon
touched the bottom of all those on the body, to find them empty.

"Bah!" he ejaculated, drawing back with a disappointed air, "I might
have known there was nothing in them. Whatever cash they've had up
there has been spent long ago, and their wine will soon be out too. His
gun I don't care for; besides, I see it's broken;--yes, the stock
snapped clean off. But this stiletto, it's worth taking with me. Even
if I shouldn't need it as a weapon, it looks like a thing Mr Pawnbroker
would appreciate."

Snatching the dagger--a silver-hilted one--from the corpse of its
ill-starred owner, he secreted it inside his tattered rag of a coat, and
without delay proceeded on.

Soon after he came to a point where the path, forsaking the cliff,
turned to the left, down the slope of the mountain. He knew that would
take him into the Pedregal, where he did not desire to go. Besides his
doubts of being able to find the way through the lava field, there was
no particular need for his attempting so difficult a track. All he
wanted was to get back to the city by the most direct route, and as soon
as possible into the presence of a man of whom during late days he had
been thinking much. For from this man he expected much, in return for a
tale he could tell him. It must be told direct, and for this reason all
caution was required. He might fall into hands that would not only
hinder him from relating it in the r