irs.

"Down 'em, boys!" he yelled furiously. "Down 'em, or our game is done
for!"

His bullet glanced from the baluster rail near Chick, and buried itself
in the wall behind him.

"Drop them, Patsy!" he shouted, instantly. "Shoot to kill! It's them or
us!"

"Let her go, Gallagher!" roared Patsy, pulling both guns.

Then, amid the tumult of the breaking tempest outside, there began a
fusillade the thunder of which rivaled that of the night, and which,
though comparatively brief, was as fast and furious as any man there had
ever experienced.

Pylotte went down at the first shot from Chick, however, with a bullet
in his brain.

Then shot followed shot with lightning rapidity.

Both detectives sprang down several stairs to evade the rain of lead,
for both Kilgore and Stall were rapidly emptying two revolvers.

A bullet singed Patsy's ear.

Another dislodged Chick's hat.

Then Kilgore reeled with a slight wound in his left arm.

A score of shots were fired and wasted, meantime, for all hands were
dodging about the hall and stairs in an utterly indescribable fashion.

It was the warmest kind of a fight for fully three minutes.

Then Chick got a line on Matt Stall from behind the baluster post, and
dropped him with a ragged wound in his hip.

Stall fell with a yell of rage and pain, and Kilgore found himself
alone, and against odds.

He turned like a flash, and darted out of the rear door of the house.

He knew that the game was up, his confederates done for, and his own
chances of escape but small; and the situation stirred to their very
depths the worst elements of this lifelong criminal.

But one thought possessed him--that of revenge, that of destroying the
chief cause of his downfall--Nick Carter.

With this end in view, Kilgore tore like a madman through the blinding
rain of that tempestuous night, and shaped his course back to the
diamond plant.

CHAPTER XXI.

AN ONLY RESOURCE.

Despite the corner in which he had placed himself, a situation far more
desperate than he at first imagined, Nick Carter was congratulating
himself upon the success of his ruse by which he had so quickly located
the secret plant of the diamond swindlers, even at the sacrifice of his
personal freedom.

The fact that he now sat bound in a chair in the hidden stronghold of
the gang, watched only by Cervera, did not seriously disturb the
fearless detective.

Nick had been in many a worse corner than this, or