Turchi watched his servant narrowly.  With assumed carelessness he said: 

“Take care, Julio, to be up by daybreak.  Go on foot to the village of Lierre; buy a good horse there, and make all possible haste to reach Diest; that is the shortest route, and you will be more likely to escape notice than on the highway.  Once in Cologne, you are out of danger; but be careful not to remain there.  Merchants from Antwerp frequently visit that city; you might possibly be recognized and arrested.  You must leave the territories of the emperor.  When the affair is forgotten, and when by my marriage with Miss Van de Werve I will have acquired a considerable fortune, I will send for you, and you will live with me as a friend rather than a servant.  You shall spend your days in pleasure, and you will never have cause to regret what you have done for me.  But, Julio, you do not answer?  Is not such a fate desirable?”

“I am overpowered by sleep,” stammered Julio, almost unintelligibly.

A triumphant smile flitted across Turchi’s face.

“To-morrow at two o’clock,” he continued, “the officers of justice will make a domiciliary visit here, but the bailiff will permit no search which intimates a suspicion.  Since you have filled the cellar with fire-wood and empty casks, the bailiff will be satisfied that all is right.  Perhaps, Julio, I may be able to recall you in two or three months.”

Julio’s head had fallen upon the table, but from time to time he started and muttered some indistinct words, showing that he was not in a deep sleep.  Without once removing his eye from him, Simon continued to speak, although he was convinced that Julio no longer heard his words.

Suddenly Julio groaned.  His head and limbs fell as though he had been struck by death; but the heaving of the chest and the deep scarlet of the cheeks proved that he was in a heavy sleep.

Simon quietly contemplated him for a while longer with a smile of satisfaction.  Then he arose, approached his servant, shook him violently, and cried out: 

“Julio, Julio, wake up!”

Julio did not stir.

“It succeeds according to my wishes,” he said.  “The poison is doing its work.  He is deaf and insensible; he reposes in an eternal sleep.  Life will be extinguished by degrees until sleep makes way for death.  But I must not tarry.  I must act quickly and forget nothing.  And first the money!”

He searched Julio’s pocket, and found in it one hundred and twenty crowns.  After counting them on the table, he exclaimed: 

“Eighty crowns spent already!  It is impossible.  He has either lost them at the gaming-table, or been robbed while he was sleeping in the tavern.”

Still doubtful, he examined his garments, and found in a purse under his girdle the twenty crowns which he had destined for his mother.

“Ah, ah!” said Simon, laughing; “I had not all; I hear the sound of gold.”