Like a sudden revelation, or a bolt out of the blue, there leaped up in Nick's mind a possible way of escape.

He thought of Cervera's garments, of the fluffy lace skirts beneath her gown, to which a single flash of fire would instantly prove fatal.

The resort to such means seemed horrible--yet Nick well knew it was the one and only resource left him.

He glanced sharply at Cervera. She was still listening at the door, with her evil face a picture of intense suspense.

With a quick turn of his wrist, Nick succeeded in extracting the box from his pocket. Then he forced it open, and with a move of his hand he scattered its entire contents over the floor around his chair. The tiny matches fell with scarce a sound, and Cervera, ten feet away, failed to hear them.

Then Nick quietly worked his chair back a foot or two, in order to bring some of the fateful things upon the floor directly in front of him.

A moment later Cervera turned from the door.

"Thunder--it was thunder," she muttered, under her breath. "There's a storm outside."

"Somebody coming?" queried Nick, with taunting accents.

He now aimed to provoke her, to force the situation to a climax, lest any mischance should have befallen Chick, or perverted in any way his own designs upon Kilgore and the gang. His taunting remark proved effective, moreover.

With a snarl of rage Cervera darted toward him, with eyes for him alone, never for the floor.

"You dog!" she cried, through her white teeth.

"Do you mock me again?"

"Oh! no, of course not," sneered Nick.

"You lie! You do! You think some one will come--that you will then escape me," screamed Cervera, quivering through and through with venomous pa.s.sion.

Nick watched her as a cat watches a mouse.

Her face was ghastly and distorted, her breast heaving, her every nerve quivering, and her eyes were like b.a.l.l.s of fire under their knitted brows.

Still clutching the poniard, her jeweled fingers worked convulsively around its haft, like those of one who fain would strike a death blow, yet whose hand was briefly held by consuming horror.

Suddenly she darted nearer, with a vicious snarl.

"You think you'll escape me," she screamed, with bitter ferocity. "It shows in your eyes. I'll make sure that you don't. Let come who may, you shall be found--dead! Dead!--do you hear?"

"Oh! yes, I hear."

"Yet you do not fear? We'll see--we'll see!"

She darted closer to him, with the weapon raised, above her head, and her knee touched Nick's knee. He swung quickly around toward her, and sc.r.a.ped his feet over the floor below her skirts.

Then came a quick, furious snapping, like the noise of a miniature fusillade. A score of the matches had been ignited by Nick's swift move.

Almost instantly a shriek of terror broke from Cervera's lips, and she reeled back, clutching wildly at her skirts.

"My G.o.d! I'm on fire!--on fire!" she screamed, with a voice so intense in its agony as to have chilled a man of stone.

A roar came from Nick as he sighted the flames under her gown.

"Release me! Release me!" he thundered, furiously, with a voice that drowned her frightful screams. "Cut me loose--loose! It's your only hope--your only hope!"

She heard him like one in a nightmare of agony and terror, and her instinct rather than her reason responded to his thundering commands.

Still with the poniard in her jeweled hand, still shrieking wildly, she leaped to his side, and with a single sweep of the keen weapon severed the rope binding his arms.

Then Nick s.n.a.t.c.hed the poniard from her hand. With several swift cuts and slashes he released his limbs, and sprang quickly to his feet.

He had already shaped his course. He had observed on the sulphur barrels, near the wall, a strip of matting, used as a cover for them.

Nick s.n.a.t.c.hed it from the barrels, and rushed to wrap it around the skirts and limbs of the terror-stricken woman.

For several moments the result seemed doubtful, so doubtful that Nick finally threw Cervera heavily to the floor, the better to press the matting closely around her and so smother the flames. In this he presently succeeded, but not before she was so severely burned as to be rendered utterly helpless.

When Nick arose to his feet Cervera remained lying prostrate on the floor, moaning with pain, yet in a state of semi-consciousness only. A glance told Nick that she could make no move to escape, and he now had other work than that of looking to her comfort.

He ran to the stone door, threw the bolts, and quickly dragged it open.

Even as he did so, from out of the gloom of the adjoining cellar, a man came into view, as if suddenly arisen from the ground.

The man was Dave Kilgore.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE LAST TRICK.

"Carter!"

"Kilgore!"

Each man uttered the name of the other, as if with the same breath. The meeting came so suddenly that, for the bare fraction of a second, both men were nonplused.

Then both whipped out a weapon.

Crack!

Bang!

They fired together, and both missed, Nick's usually accurate aim being spoiled by the gloom of the cellar.

Kilgore instantly sprang further away in the darkness, and aimed again.