"Watch you grow thin, Stefani. You want death; you shall want food
instead. Oh, a little; enough to keep you alive. You must learn
what it is to be hungry."

The squat man picked up the bundle from the table and tore off the
wrapping paper. A violin the colour of old Burgundy lay revealed.

"Boris!" The man in the chair writhed.

"Have I waked you, Stefani?" - tenderly. "The Stradivarius - the
very grand duke of fiddles! And he and his damned officers, how
they used to call out - 'Get Stefani to fiddle for us!' And you
fiddled, dragged your genius though the mud to keep your belly warm!"

"To save a soul, Boris - the boy's. When I fiddled his uncle forgot
to drag him into an orgy. Ah, yes; I fiddled, fiddled because I had
promised his mother!"

"The Italian singer! She was lucky to die when she did. She did
not see the torch, the bayonet, and the mud. But the boy did - with
his English accent! How he escaped I don't know; but he died
to-night, and the emeralds are in my pocket. See!" Karlov held
the instrument close to the other's face. "Look at it well, this
grand duke of fiddles. Look, fiddler, look!"

The huge hands pressed suddenly. There was brittle crackling, and
a rare violin became kindling. A sob broke from the prisoner's lips.
What to Karlov was a fiddle to him was a soul. He saw the madman
fling the wreckage to the floor and grind his heels into the
fragments. Gregor shut his eyes, but he could not shut his ears;