l
satisfaction. It was the look of a man who turns a trick in an
important game.

As the painter gazed at the face and figure bending forward from the
abutment's sooty shadow like some chimera or gargoyle fashioned in the
wall, his first sentiment was less one of immediate peril than of
argument with himself. Surely, so startling a denouement should serve
to revive his memory, if he had faced other muzzles there!

When the man with the pistol spoke, it was in words that were
illuminating. The voice was tremulous with emotion, probably nervous
terror, yet the tone was intended to convey irony, and was partly
successful.

"I presume," it said icily, "you wished to enjoy the sensation of
standing at that point--this time with the certainty of walking away
alive. It must be a pleasant reminiscence, but one never can tell."
The thin man paused, and then began afresh, his voice charged with a
bravado that somehow seemed to lack genuineness.

"Last time, you expected to be carried away dead--and went away
living. This time, you expected to walk away in safety, and, instead,
you've got to die. Your execution was only delayed." He gave a short,
nervous laugh, then his voice came near breaking as he went on almost
wildly: "I've got to kill you, Carter. God knows I don't want to do
it, but I must have security! This knowledge that you are watching me
to drop on me like a hawk on a rat, will drive me mad. They've told me
up and down both these God-forsaken coasts, from Ancon to Buenos
Ayres, from La Boca to Concepcion, that you would get me, and now it's
sheer self-defense with me. I know you never forgave a wrong--and God
knows that I never did you the wrong you are trying to revenge. God
knows I am innocent."

Rodman halted breathless, and stood with his flat chest rising and
falling almost hysterically. He was in the state when men are most
irresponsible and dangerous.

Meanwhile, a pistol held in an unsteady hand, its trigger under an
uncertain finger, emphasized a situation that called for electrical
thinking. To assert a mistake in identity would be ludicrous. Saxon
was not in a position to claim that. The other man seemed to have
knowledge that he himself lacked. Moreover, that knowledge was the
information which Saxon, as self-prosecutor, must have. The only
course was to meet the other's bravado with a counter show of bravado,
and keep him talking. Perhaps, some one would pass in the empty
street.

"Well," deman