bble. I'm going to get your
nerve, Nelson. I'm going to make you wabble. You're going to think
twice and doubt your own hunches, and make mistakes, and I--I shall
take advantage of them. Of course I shall do more than merely--"

"Well, by God! I knew you had the gall of the devil, but--See here,
Gray, don't you understand what I can do to you? I don't want any
trouble with you, but one word from me and--"

"Of course you want no trouble with me; but, alas! my dear Colonel, you
are going to have it. Oh, a great deal of trouble. More trouble than
you ever had in all your life. Either you are going broke, or I am. You
see, I have all the advantage in this little game, for I will pay a
dollar for every dollar I can cause you to lose, and that is too high a
price for you to meet. If I should go bankrupt, which of course I
sha'n't, it would mean nothing to me, while to you--" The speaker
shrugged. "You haven't my temperament. No, the advantage is all mine."
Gray's tone changed abruptly. "For your own good remove your hand from
the neighborhood of that drawer. I am too close to you for a gun-play.
Good! Now about that one word from you. You won't speak it, for that
would force me to utter nasty truths about you, and you would suffer
more than I, this being your home town where you are respected. And the
truth is nasty, isn't it?"

Colonel Nelson had grown very white during this long speech. He rose to
his feet and laid one shaking hand upon his desk as if to steady
himself; his tongue was thick in his mouth as he said, hoarsely:

"I'd like to think you are crazy, but--you're not."

"Almost a compliment, coming from you!"

"You think you can beat me--Want to make it a money fight, do you?
Well, I'll give you a bellyful. Every dollar I've got will go to smash
you--smash you!"

"Splendid!" Gray was on his feet now and he was smiling icily. "One or
the other of us will be ruined, and then perhaps we can resort to those
methods which both of us would enjoy using. Of the two, I believe I am
the more primitive, for the mere act of killing does not satisfy me.
I've come a long way to sink my teeth into you. Now that they're in,
they'll stay. So long as you're willing to fight clean, I'll--"

"Are you gentlemen going to talk forever?" The inquiry came in a
woman's voice. Both Nelson and Gray turned to behold a smiling,
animated face framed in a crack of the door.

"Miss Good!" Calvin Gray strode forward, took the girl's hands