of my head. Slight as it was it did not escape my guardians.

"Come, wake up, wake up!" cried the steward.

"Get on your feet, little Frenchman," growled the gondolier.
"Get up, I say," and for the second time he spurned me with his
foot.

Never in the world was a command obeyed so promptly as that one.
In an instant I had bounded to my feet and rushed as hard as I
could to the back of the hall. They were after me as I have seen
the English hounds follow a fox, but there was a long passage
down which I tore.

It turned to the left and again to the left, and then I found
myself back in the hall once more. They were almost within touch
of me and there was no time for thought. I turned toward the
staircase, but two men were coming down it. I dodged back and
tried the door through which I had been brought, but it was
fastened with great bars and I could not loosen them. The
gondolier was on me with his knife, but I met him with a kick on
the body which stretched him on his back. His dagger flew with a
clatter across the marble floor. I had no time to seize it, for
there were half a dozen of them now clutching at me. As I rushed
through them the little steward thrust his leg before me and I
fell with a crash, but I was up in an instant, and breaking from
their grasp I burst through the very middle of them and made for
a door at the other end of the hall. I reached it well in front
of them, and I gave a shout of triumph as the handle turned
freely in my hand, for I could see that it led to the outside and