The Jew would, at ordinary times, have been no match for Charlie, but the latter was far from having regained his normal strength.  His fury at the treatment he had received at the man’s hands, however, enabled him, for the moment, to exert himself to the utmost, and, after swaying backwards and forwards in desperate strife for a minute, they went to the ground with a crash, Ben Soloman being undermost.

The Jew’s grasp instantly relaxed, and Charlie, springing to his feet and seizing his cudgel, stood over his fallen antagonist.  The latter, however, did not move.  His eyes were open in a fixed stare.  Charlie looked at him in surprise for a moment, thinking he was stunned, then he saw that his right arm was twisted under him in the fall, and at once understanding what had happened, turned him half over.  He had fallen on the knife, which had penetrated to the haft, killing him instantly.

“I didn’t mean to kill you,” Charlie said aloud, “much as you deserve it, and surely as you would have killed me, if I had refused to act as a traitor.  I would have broken your head for you, but that was all.  However, it is as well as it is.  It adds to my chance of getting away, and I have no doubt there will be many who will rejoice when you are found to be missing.

“Now,” he went on, “as your agents emptied my pockets, it is no robbery to empty yours.  Money will be useful, and so will your horse.”

He stooped over the dead man, and took the purse from his girdle, when suddenly there was a rush of feet, and in a moment he was seized.  The thought flashed through his mind that he had fallen into the power of his late guardians, but a glance showed that the men standing round were strangers.

“Well, comrade, and who are you?” the man who was evidently the leader asked.  “You have saved us some trouble.  We were sleeping a hundred yards or two away, when we heard the horseman, and saw, as he passed, he was the Jew of Warsaw, to whom two or three of us owe our ruin, and it did not need more than a word for us to agree to wait for him till he came back.  We were surprised when we saw you, still more so when the Jew jumped from his horse and attacked you.  We did not interfere, because, if he had got the best of you, he might have jumped on his horse and ridden off, but directly he fell we ran out, but you were so busy in taking the spoil that you did not hear us.

“I see the Jew is dead; fell on his own knife.  It is just as well for him, for we should have tied him to a tree, and made a bonfire of him, if we had caught him.”

Charlie understood but little of this, but said when the other finished: 

“I understand but little Polish.”

“What are you then—­a Russian?  You do not look like one.”

“I am an Englishman, and am working in the house of Allan Ramsay, a Scotch trader in Warsaw.”

“Well, you are a bold fellow anyhow, and after the smart way in which you disposed of this Jew, and possessed yourself of his purse, you will do honour to our trade.”