Krometz knew well with whom he had to deal; he knew if he met Aphiz, as he proposed, there would be a chance for his life, but if he failed him, he feared the unerring aim of his rifle.  He was no coward—­both of them had faced the enemy together, but he lacked the moral courage that is far more sustaining than mere dogged bravery, or contempt for immediate danger.  Thus influence, at sunset he kept the appointment.

The young mountaineer had been taught this mode of resort to arms by the Russian and Polish officers who had been thrown much among them.  They had no seconds, but fought alone, starting back to back, walking forward five paces, wheeling and firing together.  The position was on the brink of a precipice, and he who fell would be hurled at once down an immense depth.  Aphiz was desperate, Krometz reckless; they fired and the body of the latter fell over the cliff.  Aphiz was unharmed.

In a moment after he realized his situation, has act, however just, had made him a fugitive, and he must fly at once from those scenes of his boyish love and happiness.

CHAPTER VI.

A singular meeting.

Turning from the mountain scenes we have described, let us back once more to Constantinople, and direct our footsteps up the fragrant valley where the Barbyses threads its meandering course.  Here let us look once more into the gilded cage that holds the Sultan’s favorites, where art had exhausted itself to form a fairy-like spot, as beautiful as the imagination could conceive.  We find here, once more, amid the fragrant atmosphere and the playing fountains, the form of Lalla, and by her side again that form, before which all the tribes of the faithful kneel in humble submission.  It was strange what a potent charm the dumb but beautiful Circassian had thrown about herself.  It seemed as though some fairy circle enshrined her, within which no harm might possibly reach the gentle slave.

An observant person could have noticed also a third party in that presence, though he was some distance from Lalla’s side, lying upon the ground, so near the jet of a fountain, that the spray dampened his face.  It was the idiot.  To the monarch, or his slave, he appeared unconscious of aught save the play of water; but one nearer to him would have seen that no movement of either escaped the now watchful eye of the boy.  Was it possible that he possessed a degree of reason, after all, and more than half assumed the strange guise that seemed to enshroud his wits.

Now he tossed the pure white pebble stones into the playing waters, and saw them carried up by the force of the jets, and now half rising to his elbow, startled the gold and silver fish in the basin by a tiny shower of gravel, but still with a strange tenacity, ever watching both the Sultan and his slave, though not appearing to do so.