Part 21 (1/2)

”Silfax!” exclaiether

”Who is thisalternately at his father and at the maiden

”Silfax!” repeated Nell in tones of despair, ”Silfax!”--and,with fear and agitation, she was borne away to her cha to the spot, read the threatening sentences again and again

”The hand which traced these lines,” said he at length, ”is the sa yours, Simon The man calls himself Silfax I see by your troubled manner that you know him Who is this Silfax?”

CHAPTER XVII THE ”MONK”

THIS na to the old overman It was that of the last ”monk” of the Dochart pit

In former days, before the invention of the safety-lamp, Sio daily, at the risk of his life, to produce partial explosions of fire-dae solitary being, prowling about the mine, always acco, who assisted hihted match to places Silfax was unable to reach

One day this old irl born in the randfather It was perfectly evident now that this child was Nell During the fifteen years, up to the time when she was saved by Harry, they must have lived in some secret abyss of the led coineer and Harry all that the name of Silfax had revealed to him It explained the whole ht for in the depths of New Aberfoyle

”So you knew him, Simon?” demanded Mr Starr

”Yes, that I did,” replied the over man, we used to call him Why, he was old then! He e sort of felloho held aloof fro--neither fire nor water It was his own fancy to follow the trade of 'er of the business had unsettled his brain He was prodigiously strong, and he knew the mine as no one else--at any rate, as well as I did He lived on a so”

”But,” resumed James Starr, ”what does he mean by those words, 'You have robbed me of the last vein of our oldtied--that he had a right to the e in temper the deeper the Dochart pit--his pit!--orked out It just seemed as if it was his own body that suffered froe?”

”Ay, that I do, Simon,” replied she

”I can recollect all this,” resumed Simon, ”since I have seen the naht thewe have so long sought for could be the old fireman of the Dochart pit”

”Well, now, then,” said Starr, ”it is all quite plain Chance otism of madness, he believed himself the owner of a treasure heabout day and night, he perceived that you had discovered the secret, and had written in all haste to begyours; hence, after my arrival, all the accidents that occurred, such as the block of stone thrown at Harry, the broken ladder at the Yarrow shaft, the obstruction of the openings into the wall of the new cutting; hence, in short, our iht about by the kind assistance of Nell, who acted of course without the knowledge of this man Silfax, and contrary to his intentions”

”You describe everything exactly as it must have happened, Mr Starr,”

returned old Sih now, at any rate!”

”All the better,” quoth Madge

”I don't know that,” said Starr, shaking his head; ”it is a terrible sort of ht of him must have terrified poor little Nell, and also I see that she could not bear to denounce her grandfather What a miserable time she must have had of it with the old eance,” replied Sie as himself Depend upon it, that bird isn't dead