THE NET

CONTENTS

CHAP.

I. THE TRAIN FROM PALERMO

II. A CONFESSION AND A PROMISE

III. THE GOLDEN GIRL

IV. THE FEAST AT TERRANOVA

V. WHAT WAITED AT THE ROADSIDE

VI. A NEW RESOLVE

VII. THE SEARCH BEGINS

VIII. OLD TRAILS

IX. "ONE WHO KNOWS"

X. MYRA NELL WARREN

XI. THE KIDNAPPING

XII. LA MAFIA XIII. THE BLOOD OF HIS ANCESTORS

XIV. THE NET TIGHTENS

XV. THE END OF THE QUEST

XVI. QUARANTINE

XVII. AN OBLIGATION IS MET

XVIII. BELISARIO CARDI

XIX. FELICITE

XX. THE MAN IN THE SHADOWS

XXI. UNDER FIRE

XXII. A MISUNDERSTANDING

XXIII. THE TRIAL AND THE VERDICT

XXIV. AT THE FEET OF THE STATUE

XXV. THE APPEAL

XXVI. AT THE DUSK

I

THE TRAIN FROM PALERMO

The train from Palermo was late. Already long, shadowy fingers were
reaching down the valleys across which the railroad track meandered.
Far to the left, out of an opalescent sea, rose the fairy-like Lipari
Islands, and in the farthest distance Stromboli lifted its smoking
cone above the horizon. On the landward side of the train, as it
reeled and squealed along its tortuous course, were gray and gold
Sicilian villages perched high against the hills or drowsing among
fields of artichoke and sumac and prickly pear.

To one familiar with modern Sicilian railway trains the journey
eastward from Palermo promises no considerable discomfort, but
twenty-five years ago it was not to be lightly undertaken--not to be
undertaken at all, in fact, without an unusual equipment of patience
and a resignation entirely lacking in the average Anglo-Saxon. It was
not surprising, therefore, that Norvin Blake, as the hours dragged
along, should remark less and less upon the beauties of the island and
more and more upon the medieval condition of the rickety railroad
coach in which he was shaken and buffeted about. He shifted himself to
an easier position upon the seat and lighted a cheroot; for although
this was his first glimpse of Sicily, he had watched the same villages
come and go all through a long, hot afternoon, had seen the same
groves of orange and lemon and dust-green olive-trees, the same fields
of Barbary figs, the same rose-grown garden spots, until he was
heartily tired of them all. He felt at liberty to smoke, for the only
other occupant of the compartment was a young priest in flowing mantle
and silk beaver hat.

THE NET