Unable to speak, her eyes were riveted on the door of the cottage,
which she had just opened.
With rigid fingers she pointed to the following words traced upon it
during the night: "Simon Ford, you have robbed me of the last vein
in our old pit. Harry, your son, has robbed me of Nell. Woe betide you!
Woe betide you all! Woe betide New Aberfoyle!--SILFAX."
"Silfax!" exclaimed Simon and Madge together.
"Who is this man?" demanded Harry, looking alternately at his father
and at the maiden.
"Silfax!" repeated Nell in tones of despair, "Silfax!"--and,
murmuring this name, her whole frame shuddering with fear
and agitation, she was borne away to her chamber by old Madge.
James Starr, hastening to the spot, read the threatening sentences
again and again.
"The hand which traced these lines," said he at length, "is the same
which wrote me the letter contradicting 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 name revealed everything 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, Simon had
known this fierce man, whose business it was to go daily, at the risk
of his life, to produce partial explosions of fire-damp in the passages.
He used to see this strange solitary being, prowling about the mine,
always accompanied by a monstrous owl, which he called Harfang,
who assisted him in his perilous occupation, by soaring with a lighted
match to places Silfax was unable to reach.
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