he thousand, Mr. Viner?"

The bent figure hesitated a moment; and then, with what sounded like a
despairing cry, pointed to the table.

"It's there," he whimpered. "God's curses on you, for the thief you
are."

Rhoda Gray found her eyes fixed in sudden, strained fascination on the
table--as, she imagined, the Adventurer's were too. It was bare of any
covering, nor were there any articles on its surface, nor, as far as she
could see, was there any drawer. And now the Adventurer, his right hand
still in his coat pocket, and bulging there where she knew quite well
it grasped his revolver, stepped abruptly to the table, facing the other
with the table between them.

The bent old figure still hesitated, and then, with the despairing cry
again, grasped at the top of the table, and jerked it toward him. The
surface seemed to slide sideways a little way, a matter of two or three
inches, and then stick there; but the Adventurer, in an instant, had
thrust the fingers of his left hand into the crevice. He drew out a
number of loose banknotes, and thrust his fingers in again for a further
supply.

"Open it wider!" he commanded curtly.

"I--I'm trying to," the other mumbled, and bent down to peer under the
table. "It's stuck. The catch is underneath, and--"

It seemed to Rhoda Gray, gazing into that dimly lighted room, as though
she were suddenly held spellbound as in some horrible and amazing
trance. Like a hideous jack-in-the-box the gray head popped above the
level of the table again, and quick as a flash, a revolver was
thrust into the Adventurer's face; and the Adventurer, caught at
a disadvantage, since his hand in his coat pocket was below the
intervening table top, stood there as though instantaneously transformed
into some motionless, inanimate thing, his fingers still gripping at
another sheaf of banknotes that he had been in the act of scooping out
from the narrow aperture.

And then again Rhoda Gray stared, and stared now as though bereft of her
senses; and upon her crept, cold and deadly, a fear and a terror that
seemed to engulf her very soul itself. That head that looked like a
jack-in-the-box was gone; the gray beard seemed suddenly to be shorn
away, and the gray hair too, and to fall and flutter to the table, and
the bent shoulders were not bent any more, and it wasn't Nicky Viner at
all--only a clever, a wonderfully clever, impersonation that had been
helped out by the poor and meager light. And terror gr