This matter disposed of, Ali was able to attend to his hideous family tragedy.  He began by effecting the disappearance of the women whom he had been compelled to make his accomplices; they were simply sewn up in sacks by gipsies and thrown into the lake.  This done, he himself led the executioners into a subterranean part of the castle, where they were beheaded by black mutes as a reward for their obedience.  He then sent a doctor to Zobeide; who succeeded in causing a miscarriage, and who, his work done, was seized and strangled by the black mutes who had just beheaded the gipsies.  Having thus got rid of all who could bear witness to his crime, he wrote to Veli that he might now send for his wife and two of his children, hitherto detained as hostages, and that the innocence of Zobeide would confound a calumniator who had dared to assail him with such injurious suspicions.

When this letter arrived, Pacho Bey, distrusting equally the treachery of the father and the weakness of the son, and content with having sown the seeds of dissension in his enemy’s family, had sufficient wisdom to seek safety in flight.  Ali, furious, vowed, on hearing this, that his vengeance should overtake him even at the ends of the earth.  Meanwhile he fell back on Yussuf Bey of the Debres, whose escape when lately at Janina still rankled in his mind.  As Yussuf was dangerous both from character and influence, Ali feared to attack him openly, and sought to assassinate him.  This was not precisely easy; for, exposed to a thousand dangers of this kind, the nobles of that day were on their guard.  Steel and poison were used up, and another way had to be sought.  Ali found it.

One of the many adventurers with whom Janina was filled penetrated to the pacha’s presence, and offered to sell the secret of a powder whereof three grains would suffice to kill a man with a terrible explosion—­explosive powder, in short.  Ali heard with delight, but replied that he must see it in action before purchasing.

In the dungeons of the castle by the lake, a poor monk of the order of St. Basil was slowly dying, for having boldly refused a sacrilegious simony proposed to him by Ali.  He was a fit subject for the experiment, and was successfully blown to pieces, to the great satisfaction of Ali, who concluded his bargain, and hastened to make use of it.  He prepared a false firman, which, according to custom, was enclosed and sealed in a cylindrical case, and sent to Yussuf Bey by a Greek, wholly ignorant of the real object of his mission.  Opening it without suspicion, Yussuf had his arm blown off, and died in consequence, but found time to despatch a message to Moustai Pacha of Scodra, informing him of the catastrophe, and warning him to keep good guard.

Yussuf’s letter was received by Moustai just as a similar infernal machine was placed in his hands under cover to his young wife.  The packet was seized, and a careful examination disclosed its nature.  The mother of Moustai, a jealous and cruel woman, accused her daughter-in-law of complicity, and the unfortunate Ayesha, though shortly to become a mother, expired in agony from the effects of poison, only guilty of being the innocent instrument of her grandfather’s treachery.