red to Terabon,
under his breath.

What seemed an age passed. The lights flickered. Terabon looked about in
alarm lest that gang----

A crash outside brought all to their feet, and the whole crowd fell back
against the walls. Out of the corridor surged a mass of men, and among
them stalked a stalwart giant of a man draped with the remnants of a
policeman's uniform. He had in his right hand a club which he was
swinging about him, and every six feet a man dropped upon the floor.

Terabon saw Palura writhing, twisting, and working his way among the
fighting mass. He heard a sharp bark:

"Back, boys!"

Four or five men stumbled back and two rolled out of the way of the feet
of the policeman. It flashed to Terabon what had been done. They had
succeeded in getting the policeman into the huge den of vice, where he
could not legally be without a warrant, where Palura could kill him and
escape once more on the specious plea of self-defence. Terabon saw the
grin of perfect hate on Palura's face as both his hands came up with
automatics in them--a two-handed gunman with his prey.

This would teach the policemen of Mendova to mind their own business!
Suddenly Policeman Laddam threw his night stick backhanded at the
infamous scoundrel, and Palura dodged, but not quite quickly nor quite
far enough. The club whacked noisily against his right elbow and Palura
uttered a cry of pain as one pistol fell to the floor.

Then Laddam snatched out his own automatic, a 45-calibre gun, three
pounds or more in weight, and began to shoot, calmly, deliberately, and
with the artistic appreciation of doing a good job thoroughly.

His first bullet drove Palura straight up, erect; his next carried the
bully back three steps; his next whirled him around in a sagging spiral,
and the fourth dropped the dive keeper like a bag of loose potatoes.

Laddam looked around curiously. He had never been there before. Lined up
on all sides of him were the waiters, bouncers, men of prey, their
faces ghastly, and three or four of them sick. The silent throng around
the walls stared at the scene from the partial shadows; no one seemed
even to be breathing. Then Palura made a horrible gulping sound, and
writhed as he gave up his last gasp of life.

"Now then!" Laddam looked about him, and his voice was the low roar of a
man at his kill. "You men pick them up, pack them outside there, and up
to headquarters. March!"

As one man, the men who had been Palura's