t become too much for you to-day,
and then I should have to kill you, and for your wife's sake I don't
want to do that. I always feel sorry for a woman with a husband like
you. You could never shoot me. You couldn't be quick enough, but you
might try. Then I should end you, and there'd be another trial; but the
lawyer who defended me would not have to cross-examine any witness
about your character. It is too well-known, Burlingame. Out with it--the
pistol!" he added, standing menacingly over the other.

In a kind of stupor, under the storm that was breaking above him,
Burlingame slowly drew out of a capacious waistcoat pocket a tiny but
powerful pistol of the most modern make.

"Put it in my hand," insisted Crozier, his eyes on the other's.

The flabby hand laid the weapon in Crozier's lean and strenuous fingers.
Crozier calmly withdrew the cartridges and then tossed the weapon back
on the table.

"Now we have equality of opportunity," he remarked quietly. "If you
think you would like to repeat any slander that's slid off your foul
tongue, do it now; and in a moment or two Mrs. Tynan can turn the hose
on the floor of this room."

"I want to get to business," said Burlingame sullenly, as he took from
his pocket a paper.

Crozier nodded. "I can imagine your haste," he remarked. "You need all
the fees you can get to pay Belle Bingley's bills."

Burlingame did not wince. He made no reply to the challenge that he was
the chief supporter of a certain wanton thereabouts.

"The time for your option to take ten thousand dollars' worth of shares
in the syndicate is up," he said; "and I am instructed to inform you
that Messrs. Bradley, Willingden, Baxter, & Simmons propose to take over
your unpaid shares and to complete the transaction without you."

"Who informed Messrs. Bradley, Willingden, Baxter, & Simmons that I am
not prepared to pay for my shares?" asked Crozier sharply.

"The time is up," surlily replied Burlingame. "It is assumed you can't
take up your shares, and that you don't want to do so. The time us up,"
he added emphatically, and he tapped the paper spread before him on the
table.

Crozier's eyes half closed in an access of stubbornness and hatred.
"You are not to assume anything whatever," he declared. "You are to
accommodate yourself to actual facts. The time is not up. It is not up
till midnight, and any action taken before then on any other assumption
will give grounds for damages."

Crozier spok