it! Will he?"

The letter was from John Harris. It ran:

"Hadgi Stavros,--Photini is now on my ship, the _Fancy_,
which carries four guns. She remains a hostage as long as
Hermann Schultz remains a prisoner. As you treat my friend, so
I will treat your daughter. She shall pay hair for hair, tooth
for tooth, head for head. Answer at once, or I will come and
see you.--JOHN HARRIS."

"I know Photini," I said to the king, "and I swear that she will not be
harmed. But I must return to Athens at once. Get four of your men to
carry me down the mountains in a litter."

The king rose up, and then groaned and staggered. I remembered the
arsenic. He must have eaten some of the meat. I tickled the inside of
his throat, and he brought up most of the poison. Soon afterwards the
other brigands came up to the enclosure, screaming with pain, and wanted
to murder me. I had cast a spell over their meat, and it was torturing
them, they cried. I must be killed at once, and then the spell would be
removed. The king commanded them to withdraw. They resisted. He drew his
saber, and cut down two of the ringleaders. The rest seized their guns
and began to shoot. There were about sixty of them, all suffering, more
or less, from the effects of arsenic poisoning. We were only twelve in
number, but our men had the steadier aim; and the king fought like a
hero, though his hands and feet were swelling painfully.

The fact was that he had eaten some time before his men, and I could not
therefore get the poison completely out of his system. But it was the
arsenic that saved his life. He had at last to come and lie down beside
me. We heard the sound of rapid firing in the distance; and suddenly two
men entered our enclosure, with revolvers in each hand, and shot down
our defenders with an extraordinary quickness of aim. They were Harris
and Lobster.

"Hermann, where are you?" Harris yelled at last, with all his strength,
as he turned and found nothing more to shoot at.

"Here," I replied. "The men you've just killed have been fighting for
me. There has been civil war in the camp."

"Well, we've stamped it out!" said Harris. "What's the matter with the
old scoundrel lying beside you?"

"It's Hadgi Stavros," I said. "He and his men have been eating some
arsenic I had in my collecting case."

My friends managed to carry me down the mountain, and at the first
village we came to they got a carriage and took me to Athe