THE RING OF IRON.
A boat full of musicians appeared, gliding slowly past them in the
moonlight, surrounded by many gondolas. To the throbbing of the harp and
guitar, a score of voices were chanting an Italian song.
“Splendid! magnificent!” breathed the professor.
The singing ceased. The gondolas swung near the music barge, from which
white, phantom hands were outstretched. Into those hands fell silver
coins, and the gondolas swept away.
Dick spoke a word of command to Reggio, who quickly sent them close to
the boat of the singers. Merriwell added his contribution to the
collection the musicians were taking up.
“There’s still music in Venice,” said Dick, as they drifted away.
“But now,” said Professor Gunn, “the musicians are professionals, who
take that way of making a living.”
“Then,” spoke Dick, “in a certain sense it is true that—
“‘In Venice Tasso’s echoes are no more,
And silent rows the songless gondolier:
Her palaces are crumbling to the shore,
And music meets not always now the ear;
Those days are gone—but beauty still is here.’”
“Well quoted, my boy!” exclaimed the old pedagogue, in deep
satisfaction.
“Let’s follow the music boat,” suggested Brad. “That singing has stirred
up something a whole lot inside of me. I sure would like to hear some
more.”
So Reggio was instructed to follow the musicians.
Some fifteen minutes later, perhaps, the music boat turned into a
narrow, close canal, where all was darkness and gloom, with never a
gleam of light, save from the gondolas, where lamps twinkled and moved
like wills-o’-the-wisp. The boats were lost in the blackness of the
place, the lights alone marking their movements.
“Another right fine place for a race with death, pard,” whispered Brad.
“Why have they turned in here?” whispered the professor apprehensively.
“We’ll find out,” said Dick. “We must be close to the Bridge of Sighs.
Yes, you can see it against the sky. There it is.”
“With a palace and a prison on either hand,” murmured Zenas.
The beautiful bridge could be seen, buttressed by two great hulks of
gloom. It was a ghostly place, and the cool air of the night seemed to
take on a deeper chill.
The music barge floated beneath the arch of the bridge and stopped.
Reggio permitted his gondola to slowly move along until it was also
beneath the bridge. Above them was the terrible prison. Beneath them was
the dark and sluggish waters. Dick thought of the headless bodies that
once had awaited the changing tide that was to bear them away from that
bloodstained spot to outer sea.
Suddenly the musicians began to play and chant a solemn song, full of
sadness and despair. Enraptured, enthralled, their blood cold in their
bodies, the boys and the old professor listened to the most thrilling
and impressive music that had ever greeted their ears. In fancy, Dick
seemed to hear the tread of the condemned passing over the bloody
bridge, the moans of the dying within those black walls. The air
shuddered and vibrated with the horror of it.
Never as long as life lasted could any of that trio forget that chanted
song.
When it ended at last, they seemed turned to stone themselves. It was
several moments before one of them stirred or even seemed to breathe.
“Let’s get out of here!” Brad finally suggested, chokingly.
“Grand, but terrible!” muttered the professor.
“I would not have missed it for worlds!” declared Dick.
Reggio swung the gondola round, and they were soon moving toward the
open canal.
Just as they passed out of the deeper darkness, a black gondola swept
close to them—so close that the two boats almost touched.
An unseen person reached forth a ghostly hand from between divided black
curtains, and something was tossed through the air, falling with a
little clang at the feet of Reggio. It sounded not unlike the ring of
money.
Then the phantom hand disappeared and the gondola slipped swiftly into
the blackness from which they had just emerged, being lost to view.
“What was it?” muttered Buckhart. “Did some one throw Reggio a coin?”
Dick grasped the arm of his bosom friend.
“Look!” he breathed. “Look at Reggio!”
The gondolier had not moved after the thing dropped at his feet. He was
poised with his body swayed backward a little, and he seemed to be
gazing with wide-open eyes at the mysterious object lying within ten
inches of his feet. His attitude was expressive of the greatest horror.
“Whatever does it mean?” speculated the Texan. “He certain looks a whole
lot alarmed.”
Dick started to speak to the gondolier, but checked himself and
continued to watch the man.
Onward glided the boat, out into the full flood of moonlight.
Then the man at the oar could plainly see the thing that had been cast
before him. Slowly, slowly, as if dreading to touch it, yet forcing
himself to perform the act, Reggio stooped and picked it up.
“At last!” he muttered, with a choking sound—“at last it has come to
me!”
“What is it?” questioned Dick.
“Death!” answered the man.
“Death?” exclaimed Professor Gunn. “Why, what do you——”
“See!” directed the gondolier, holding the object up in the moonlight.
“Here it is! By this I am told that I must die!”
“What is it?”
“A ring of iron.”
“A ring of iron? What has that to do with your death?”
“It tells me that I am chosen. I have a few hours in which to settle my
affairs and make ready. I knew that death pursued us to-night!”
“He’s still making crazy talk, pard!” declared Brad, who could
understand Italian, although he made a mess in attempting to speak it.
“The man is not crazy,” asserted Dick positively.
“He sure talks that way.”
“There is something behind all this, Brad—something I’d like to
understand.”
Professor Gunn continued to question Reggio. They seemed quite alone
just then, with no other boats near them.
“I warned you not to speak of the Ten,” said the gondolier. “It is now
too late.”
“But the Council of Ten no longer exists.”
“Not as once it did; but there is another. Oh, if I talk now it will
only hasten the end! I am chosen, anyhow, and there is no escape! Little
Teresa, my sister—what will become of her!”
The man seemed utterly crushed and hopeless. All the buoyant life and
grace had departed from his body. His shoulders were bowed and his
appearance that of one aged twenty years in a few moments.
“Boys,” said Professor Gunn, “there is something mighty singular and
sinister back of this. That man is badly frightened.”
“Or doing stunts,” muttered Buckhart.
“No stunts,” asserted Dick. “His terror and despair is genuine.
Evidently the iron ring is a sign of some sort. He believes that the
receipt of it dooms him to death.”
“Folly.”
“Perhaps not.”
For a little time now Reggio answered none of their questions. Finally
he straightened up and looked around. He lifted his arms and stretched
them out to the white buildings with a despairing gesture.
“Farewell—farewell, Venice!” he murmured, with a sob. “This is my last
night with you! For the last time I look on your beauty! Before another
night my eyes will be closed in the long, long sleep.”
Then suddenly he seemed to realize that the others were looking and
listening. He threw back his shoulders, drew in a deep breath, and with
that breath his manhood seemed to return. He made a careless gesture of
his hand.
“It is nothing to you, signors,” he said. “Mind not anything you have
seen or heard. But it is better that you should leave Venice, for I have
spoken to you of the Ten.”
“But you have not explained—you have not told us what you mean,” said
the professor.
“It is better that you should not know. Your knowledge would place you
in peril. Talk no more of the Ten. Keep your lips tightly closed, if you
value your lives—and leave Venice.”
“Well, I like that!” growled Brad, in a manner that plainly told he did
not like it. “I opine we won’t be chased out of Venice in any such
manner.”
“Not much!” declared Dick earnestly. “We’ll remain and solve the mystery
of the Ten.”
In vain they tried to learn anything further from the gondolier. He
became silent, and no amount of questioning elicited anything of a
satisfactory sort.
“I must return to Teresa,” he finally said. “It is the last time I shall
see her.”
He then insisted on taking them without delay to their lodgings. On the
way, he swung the gondola into another dark and narrow canal. A peculiar
whistle sounded from his lips, causing Professor Gunn, who was very
nervous by this time, to give a jump of alarm.
“My! my!” muttered the old pedagogue. “I’m expecting anything to happen!
I’m looking for assassins everywhere. Why did he whistle? What does it
mean?”
The answer came in the form of a gleam of light from a window in the
wall on their left.
Reggio uttered a soft exclamation of satisfaction.
“Teresa is waiting for me, signors,” he said. “I must hasten with you
and then return.”
“So this is his ranch,” said Buckhart. “He camps here, I judge.”
But now a change came over the gondolier. The light above had been shut
off suddenly. Darkness followed for a moment, after which the light
gleamed again. Again it disappeared for a few seconds, and again it
gleamed.
“Trouble!” hissed Reggio. “Teresa has made the danger signal!”
“Dear! dear! dear!” gasped Zenas Gunn. “This is terrible! It is so dark.
In the light of day I am brave as a lion—I fear nothing. But this
darkness is so treacherous that I—really I’m disturbed.”
“Signors,” entreated the gondolier, “I entreat you a moment to wait,
till I see what danger it is that has alarmed my sister. When I have
reassured her, I will hasten to take you on your way.”
“All right, Reggio,” said Dick promptly. “We can wait. In fact, we’re in
no haste.”
“Hum! ha!” coughed Zenas. “I am in haste to get out of this dark
spot—indeed I am!”
“But you would not leave a lady in trouble, professor?” remonstrated
Dick. “I know you would not do that, for you are the soul of chivalry.
Where the fair sex is concerned, you are ever ready to face peril or
death.”
“That’s right,” agreed the old pedagogue, bracing up. “You understand me
perfectly, Richard. You are a very astute lad. Reggio, we will wait.”
“And,” added Dick, “if you need our assistance, you may depend on us.”
The gondolier poured out his thanks, swung the craft alongside some dark
steps, fastened it to a ring of iron set in the marble, and then stepped
out, saying he would make great haste.
He had not ascended more than three of the steps when he paused. At the
same moment, from some dark nook, a figure stepped out above him.
“Who is there?” challenged the gondolier.
“A friend, Reggio Tortora,” came the answer, in perfect Italian, the
voice being soft and musical.
“A friend?” retorted the gondolier, suspiciously. “What are you doing
here?”
“Waiting for your return.”
“Who are you?”
“You know me well.”
“I know you not.”
A laugh sounded low and soft in the darkness.
“Your ears must be losing their cunning, Reggio. Why, I should recognize
your voice anywhere in all the world that I heard it. Come nearer.”
But the gondolier had been warned of death that hovered over him, and he
did not move.
“If you are my friend,” he said, “why do you lurk like an assassin at my
door?”
Again that musical laugh echoed between those dark walls.
“You seem timid as a rabbit, Reggio. Is this the brave, careless Tortora
I knew so well? It cannot be.”
The gondolier was angered by the mockery of the words and laughter, but
he did not forget that the iron ring had fallen at his feet a short time
before. Might this not be the man chosen by the Ten to strike the fatal
blow?
“Reggio,” called Dick, standing up and preparing to step from the
gondola to the steps, “if you need aid, you may rely on us.”
“You bet your boots!” exclaimed Buckhart, eager to do something. “Just
say the word, Reg, and we’ll get right into the game. I’m beginning to
spoil for a rumpus, and I’m the Unbranded Maverick of the Rio Pecos.
When I get my war paint on and take to the trail, I’m a holy howler on
ten wheels.”
“Boys, boys!” spluttered the agitated old professor, “do be careful!
Don’t leave me here! I must protect you. I must take care of you. If any
harm comes to you, I’ll never forgive myself.”
“Don’t worry, professor,” said Dick.
“Just keep your clothes on, professor,” urged Brad.
“There is but one,” said Reggio, in answer to Dick. “I need no aid in
facing one man.”
Again the stranger laughed.
“Even though you are changed,” he said, “you yet have a little pride, my
Reggio. But why should you fear me! I am here to do you a great
service.”
“To do me a service?”
“Even so, my Reggio.”
“What service?”
“I would save your life.”
“How is that—how can it be?”
“You are under the ban of the Terrible Ten,” whispered the stranger,
leaning forward in the darkness, and sending the words down the steps at
the gondolier.
“How know you that unless you are my enemy—unless you are the assassin
sent to do the deed?” demanded Reggio.
“I know many things, but my means of knowledge I keep in my own breast.
You doubt me? I swear to you that I can save you, and will—on a certain
condition.”
“No one condemned by the Ten has ever escaped,” retorted Reggio.
“You shall be the first—if you agree to terms I will offer.”
“What are the terms?” doubtingly inquired the doomed man.
“Will you accept them?”
“I will not become a murderer and a thief!” was the fierce retort. “I
will not plunder and slay, and give one-half my evil gain to those
criminals who hide their faces and are growing wealthy through the black
crimes other men commit out of fear of them. I am a man! My ancestors
were of the Castellani—the aristocrats of the red hoods. Never one of
them has descended to the ranks of crime. It is because of that thing
that I am now condemned to the assassin. The Ten claim they are the
descendants of the black-hooded Nicolletti, and that they are avenging
the old wrongs of their class. It is a lie! They are thieves and
murderers, banded together for plunder. They strike no blows with their
own hands, but they frighten others into doing the dark work and giving
them half the plunder. Not even their tools know who compose the Ten,
whose faces are always hidden. No man dares betray them by confessing.
If he is caught red-handed, he takes all the blame, and tells it not
that those who drove him to his crimes, and have shared his plunder, are
the Ten, for if he should speak, he knows the ban of death will fall on
all his family and all his blood relations.”
Repeatedly the stranger had tried to check the torrent of words flowing
from Reggie’s lips, but his efforts had been unavailing. The speaker was
aroused to a pitch of desperation, and he would not be silenced until he
had finished.
“I fear not to speak!” he exclaimed. “I know I must die, for I have
received the iron ring.”
“You fool!” hissed the other. “Do you not think of Teresa? What will
happen to her if you talk like this?”
Reggie’s aspect of defiant rage suddenly departed, his shoulders drooped
and he lifted his shaking hand to his eyes.
“Teresa!” he whispered. “Teresa, my sister! What have I done?”
“You have spoken like a crazy fool in the presence of foreigners,”
declared the other man. “Still, besides them, I am the only one who has
heard your words, and I am your friend. Their lips must be silenced, for
if they speak one word of this, Teresa is doomed!”
Once more Reggio straightened himself somewhat defiantly.
“What mean you?” he demanded. “Their lips must be silenced, you say.
What mean you?”
“You know.”
“They shall not be harmed while with me!” exclaimed the gondolier. “No
man I have ever served has come to harm through me.”
“Oh, Lord, boys! Oh, Lord!” palpitated Zenas Gunn, almost overcome by
horror. “Do you hear? Do you understand? They are speaking of murder—of
killing us!”
“But Reggio is on the level,” said Dick.
“Great howling coyotes!” exclaimed Buckhart. “It begins to look some as
if we were going to get mixed up with this Ten, whoever they are.”
“Tortora,” said the stranger, “you are a great fool! You will be slain,
the strangers will disappear, and Teresa—it will be left for me to save
her.”
“For you?”
“Yes.”
“Why, you?”
“Because she is the fairest flower of Venice! Because my sleeping dreams
of her and my waking thoughts of her have brought me back to Venice from
America, far over the seas.”
“By the saints!” cried Reggio, “you are Nicola Mullura!”