Belmonti, but within a very few days, if not immediately, Madame Schuber
and a certain Mrs. White--who does not become prominent--followed down
to the cabaret. Mrs. White went out somewhere on the premises, found
Salome at work, and remained with her, while Madame Schuber confronted
Belmonti, and, revealing Salome's identity and its proofs, demanded her
instant release.

Belmonti refused to let her go. But while doing so he admitted his belief
that she might be of pure white blood and of right entitled to freedom. He
confessed having gone back to John F. Müller[28] soon after buying her and
proposing to set her free; but Müller, he said, had replied that in such a
case the law required her to leave the country. Thereupon Belmonti had
demanded that the sale be rescinded, saying: "I have paid you my money for
her."

"But," said Müller, "I did not sell her to you as a slave. She is as white
as you or I, and neither of us can hold her if she chooses to go away."

Such at least was Belmonti's confession, yet he was as far from consenting
to let his captive go after this confession was made as he had been
before. He seems actually to have kept her for a while; but at length she
went boldly to Schuber's house, became one of his household, and with his
advice and aid asserted her intention to establish her freedom by an
appeal to law. Belmonti replied with threats of public imprisonment, the
chain-gang, and the auctioneer's block.

Salome, or Sally, for that seems to be the nickname by which her kindred
remembered her, was never to be sold again; but not many months were to
pass before she was to find herself, on her own petition and bond of
$500, a prisoner, by the only choice the laws allowed her, in the famous