there was a wild flurry of furry, tearing legs and a blood-streaked
white body between them, trying desperately to evade their slicing
strokes. They pitched down the bank together, animal and man
struggling silently to the death; and when they jarred to a stop in
the water below, Garth's strategy was achieved.

He was uppermost; his grip was steel around the throbbing throat, and
the hundred and eighty pound weight of his body was holding the legs
powerless. Not an inch from his face the weasel's fangs clashed
frantically together. Garth maintained his clutch, squeezing with
every bit of his mighty strength. The animal shuddered; then writhed
in the death convulsions; at last lay still.

Panting, his mind a welter of primate emotions roused by the kill, the
man shook it a last time, jumped to his feet and glared around--to see
the beam of a flashlight only a dozen yards away. His more deadly foe,
the human foe, was upon him. Perhaps the sounds of the fight had
reached his ears.

Garth lost not a moment. Quickly he slung the weasel's body back into
the hole and jammed himself down after it.

* * * * *

Hagendorff approached slowly, mumbling and cursing to himself in
sullen ill-humor. Things were not going as he had expected them to.
The white ray scoured the banks of the stream, searching doggedly.
Nearer he came, and with each step the watching midget's rapid
breathing grew tighter. The towering body was more than shadow now.
Another ten feet and the flashlight would find the marks of the fight.

But the titan's patience gave out. Closer than he had yet been to his
quarry, he paused, and again the thunder of his voice broke the
night's hush.

"Bah! This is foolish! In daylight I find him certainly. I have waited
long; I can wait a little more. I need sleep. To-morrow, it will be
different!"

He swung away from the stream, and in a few minutes the rip and crash
of his progress through the bush had died. In the silence, Garth
Howard considered his situation.

He faced it squarely, as was his custom. He did not brood over the
treachery of his assistant, or of how unfairly and suddenly it had
plunged him into peril and robbed him of his normal body. He accepted
his position and searched for possible angles of escape. There were
not many hours left in which to make a decisive move. The island was
small, and, as Hagendorff had said, discovery would be inevitable in
daytime.

Garth