He signed warrants for the arrest of the Messiah, Krasnojabkin and some fifteen others of those who had escaped his wrath on the previous occasion.  They would be under lock and key within two hours.  Don Giustino would never interfere on behalf of these aliens.  Nor would any one else.  An inspiration!  It would proclaim his zeal for the public order—­his official independence of mind.

And—­yes.  There was one other little thing.

He hobbled to where the various pieces JUSTIFICATIVES were lying in their sealed envelopes.  He took up the receptacle containing the gold talisman which had been sequestrated from the priest’s nephew, and broke it open.  It could always be sealed up again.  The coin, attached to its string, fell out; it was an old-fashioned medal—­Spanish, apparently.  He fingered it awhile.  Then, opening the packet which held Muhlen’s gold, he carefully examined the contents.  Five or six of these coins were of the same kind.  French Napoleons.  That was lucky.  Any stick was good enough to beat a dog with.  This was a particularly good stick.  He bored a hole through one of the Napoleons and placed it on the culprit’s string, after removing the original talisman, which he bestowed in his own pocket.  That done, he sealed up the two parcels again, conscientiously.

“There!” he said.  “He laughs best who laughs last.  Don Giustino is a clever man.  But the devil himself could not prove the prisoner innocent, in the face of evidence like this.  Down with the Pope!”

Never had he felt so enlightened, so gloriously freemasonish.

CHAPTER XXXV

The commendatore Giustino Morena—­familiarly known as Don Giustino or, by his enemies, as “the assassin”—­was a Southerner by birth, a city product.  From low surroundings he had risen to be a prominent member of the Chamber of Deputies and one of the most impressive figures in the country.

As a child he was apprenticed to a cobbler.  There, bending over his work on the pavement outside the shop-door, his blue eyes and curly fair hair, his rosy cheeks, his winning smile, his precocious retorts, attracted the most favourable comment from the passers-by and secured him an unfailing supply of chocolates and cigarettes.  People liked him so much that he quickly learned not only how to mend shoes but a good many other things which they were anxious to teach him.  His grown-up friends vied with one another for a place in his affections and a certain scandalous affair with knives, which somehow or other got into the daily press where it had no business to be, put the seal on his reputation in the quarter.

“That boy will go far!” the old men and women used to say.  “Only look at his blue eyes.  Blessed the mother that bore him, whoever she was”—­for nobody even pretended to know.