Page 195 - A Jacobite Exile

The Jew would, at ordinary times, have been no match for Charlie, but the
latter was far from having regained his normal strength. His fury at the

treatment he had received at the man's hands, however, enabled him, for the
moment, to exert himself to the utmost, and, after swaying backwards and

forwards in desperate strife for a minute, they went to the ground with a
crash, Ben Soloman being undermost.

The Jew's grasp instantly relaxed, and Charlie, springing to his feet and
seizing his cudgel, stood over his fallen antagonist. The latter, however, did

not move. His eyes were open in a fixed stare. Charlie looked at him in
surprise for a moment, thinking he was stunned, then he saw that his right
arm was twisted under him in the fall, and at once understanding what had

happened, turned him half over. He had fallen on the knife, which had
penetrated to the haft, killing him instantly.

"I didn't mean to kill you," Charlie said aloud, "much as you deserve it, and
surely as you would have killed me, if I had refused to act as a traitor. I

would have broken your head for you, but that was all. However, it is as
well as it is. It adds to my chance of getting away, and I have no doubt

there will be many who will rejoice when you are found to be missing.

"Now," he went on, "as your agents emptied my pockets, it is no robbery to

empty yours. Money will be useful, and so will your horse."

He stooped over the dead man, and took the purse from his girdle, when
suddenly there was a rush of feet, and in a moment he was seized. The
thought flashed through his mind that he had fallen into the power of his

late guardians, but a glance showed that the men standing round were
strangers.

"Well, comrade, and who are you?" the man who was evidently the leader
asked. "You have saved us some trouble. We were sleeping a hundred

yards or two away, when we heard the horseman, and saw, as he passed, he
was the Jew of Warsaw, to whom two or three of us owe our ruin, and it did

not need more than a word for us to agree to wait for him till he came back.
We were surprised when we saw you, still more so when the Jew jumped