It was the same voice that had
already shouted, _"Traditore!"_ through the shutters of the dining-room;
this time it made a complete and clear statement. If the traitor
"Oddlestone" were given up, all others should be spared; if not, no one
should escape to tell the tale.
"Well, Huddlestone, what do you say to that?" asked Northmour, turning to
the bed.
Up to that moment the banker had given no sign of life, and I, at least,
had supposed him to be still lying in a faint; but he replied at once, and
in such tones as I have never heard elsewhere, save from a delirious
patient, adjured and besought us not to desert him. It was the most
hideous and abject performance that my imagination can conceive.
"Enough," cried Northmour; and then he threw open the window, leaned out
into the night, and in a tone of exultation, and with a total
forgetfulness of what was due to the presence of a lady, poured out upon
the ambassador a string of the most abominable raillery both in English
and Italian, and bade him be gone where he had come from. I believe that
nothing so delighted Northmour at that moment as the thought that we must
all infallibly perish before the night was out.
Meantime, the Italian put his flag of truce into his pocket, and
disappeared, at a leisurely pace, among the sand hills.
"They make honorable war," said Northmour.
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