A few minutes later he was among them, listening with his cool, half-satirical smile to their protestations of joy and relief, assailed by more questions than he could well answer in a day, his every expression a protest against their contention that he had done a brave and wonderful thing.

“Nonsense,” he said in his most deprecating voice, taking a seat beside the Princess on the railing and fanning himself lazily with his hat to the mortification of his body-servant, who waved a huge palm leaf in vigorous adulation.  “It was nothing.  Just being a witness, that’s all.  You’ll find how easy it is when you get back to London and have to testify in the Skaggs will contest.  Tell the truth, that’s all.”  The Princess was now looking at his brown face with eyes over which she had lost control.  “Oh, by the by,” he said, as if struck by a sudden thought.  He turned toward the shady court below, where the eager refugees from Aratat were congregated.  A deep, almost sepulchral tone came into his voice as he addressed himself to the veiled wives of Jacob von Blitz.  “It is my painful duty to announce to the Mesdames von Blitz that they are widows.”

There was a dead silence.  The three women stared up at him, uncomprehending.

“Yes,” he went on solemnly, “Jacob is no more.  He was found guilty by his judges and executed with commendable haste and precision.  I will say this for your lamented husband:  he met his fate like a man and a German—­without a quiver.  He took his medicine bravely—­twelve leaden pills administered by as many skilful surgeons.  It is perhaps just as well for you that you are widows.  If he had lived long enough he would have made a widower of himself.”  The three wives of Von Blitz hugged themselves and cried out in their joy!  “But it is yet too early to congratulate yourselves on your freedom.  Rasula has promised to kill all of us, whether we deserve it or not, so I daresay we’d better postpone the celebration until we’re entirely out of the woods.”

“They shot him?” demanded Deppingham, when he had finished.

“Admirably.  By Jove, those fellows can shoot!  They accepted my word against his—­which is most gratifying to my pride.  One other man testified against him—­a chap who saw him with the Boers not ten minutes before the attempt was made to rob the vaults.  Rasula appeared as counsel for the defence.  Merely a matter of form.  He knew that he was guilty.  There was no talk of a new trial; no appeal to the supreme court, Britt; no expense to the community.”

He was as unconcerned about it as if discussing the most trivial happening of the day.  Five ancient men had sat with the venerable Cadi as judges in the market-place.  There were no frills, no disputes, no summing up of the case by state or defendant.  The judges weighed the evidence; they used their own judgment as to the law and the penalty.  They found him guilty.  Von Blitz lived not ten minutes after sentence was passed.