one passion, the passion to kill. You cannot conceive of the years
of agony spent by that creature strapped to a wooden frame--in
order to prevent his growth! You cannot conceive of his fierce
hatred of all humanity, inflamed to madness by the Eastern drug,
hashish, and directed against the enemies of Islam--the holders of
the slipper--by the wonderful power of Hassan of Aleppo.

But I had not only read of such beings, I had encountered one!

And he was but one of the many instruments of the Hashishin. Perhaps
the girl with the violet eyes was another. What else to be dreaded
Hassan might hold in store for us I could not conjecture.

Do you wonder that I feared? Do you wonder that I hoped (I confess
it), hoped that the slipper might be recovered without further
bloodshed?




CHAPTER XI

THE HOLE IN THE BLIND


I stepped over to the door, where a constable stood on duty.

"You observed a tall Eastern gentleman in the room a while ago,
officer?"