I gave him no answer. I still stared at him in silence.
"Come!" he continued, his hawk's eyes bent on my face, "make a clean breast of it, and perhaps--who knows? I may help you yet, lad. You have puzzled and foiled me, and I want to understand you. Where did my lady pick you up just when she wanted you? I had arranged for every checker on the board except you. Who are you?"
This time I did answer him--by a question. "How many times have we met?" I asked.
"Three," he said readily, "and the last time you nearly rid the world of me. Now the luck is against you. It generally is in the end against those who thwart me, my friend." He chuckled at the conceit, and I read in his face at once his love of intrigue and his vanity. "I come uppermost, as always."
"What do you want?" I asked. I felt a certain expectation. He wanted something.
He smiled dryly, sitting opposite to me. He had drawn up a stool, and made himself comfortable. He was not an uncomely man as he sat there playing with his dagger, a dubious smile on his lean, dark face. Unwarned, I might have been attracted by the masterful audacity, the intellect as well as the force which I saw stamped on his features. Being warned, I read cunning in his bold eyes, and cruelty in the curl of his lip. "What do you want next?" I asked.
"I want to save your life," he replied lightly.
"Ha! ha!" he laughed, "I thought the stoicism did not go quite down to the bottom, my lad. But there, it is true enough, I have come to help you. I have come to save your life if you will let me."
I strove in vain to keep entire mastery over myself. The feelings to which he appealed were too strong for me. My voice sounded strange, even in my own ears, as I said hoarsely, "It is impossible! What can you do?"
"What can I do?" he answered with a stern smile. "Much! I have, boy, a dozen strings in my hands, and a neck--a life at the end of each!"
He raised his hand, and extending the fingers, moved them to and fro.
"See! see! A life, a death!" he exclaimed. "And for you, I can and will save your life--on one condition."
"Ay, on one condition; but it is a very easy one. I will save your life on my part; and you, on yours, must give me a little assistance. Do you see? Then we shall be quits."