I—THE RENDEZVOUS

THE metamorphosis in Dave Henderson's appearance since the night, nine days ago, when he had left San Francisco and Nicolo Capriano's house, had been, by necessity, gradual; it had attained its finished state now, as he stepped from a train to one of the sub-level station platforms in the City of New York. Then, he had been attired in one of the old Italian's cast-off and ill-fitting suits, an object neither too respectable nor presentable; now, the wide-brimmed soft hat was new and good, and the dark tweed suit, of expensive material, was that of a well-groomed man.

It had taken time—all this. Nor had it been entirely simple of accomplishment, in spite of the ample funds received from Square John Kelly, funds that now, wary of unsavory corners into which a certain business that he had on hand might lead him here in New York, he had taken the precaution to secrete about his person in a money belt beneath his underclothing.

He had scarcely needed old Nicolo Capriano's warning to be careful. Dave Henderson had not changed so much in five years in prison that he could take liberties with the risk of recognition in that section of the country where, in the days before, he had been so familiar a figure on the local race-tracks. He had made his way out of California, and considerably beyond California, in the same way that, once before, he had attempted to elude the police—and on which former occasion would have succeeded, he was quite satisfied, had it not been for the wound that had finally robbed him of consciousness and placed him at their mercy.

He had traveled during three nights, and only at night, in boxcars, and on freight trains, stealing his way. But there had been no hurry. The night of the twenty-fourth of June, the date of the rendezvous that Millman had given him, had not been very far off, and though it had always obtruded itself upon him and never allowed itself to be forgotten from the moment he had heard it from Millman's lips, he had consistently told himself that the twenty-fourth of June was a consideration to be entirely disregarded. Since Millman was a thief and had double-crossed him, the rendezvous was blatantly a fake. It existed only as a sort of jeering, ironical barb with which Millman at times, out of the nowhere, like a specter, grinning maliciously, prodded and made devil's sport of him. He had no concern with Millman's twenty-fourth of June! He would meet Millman in due time—two hemispheres were not big enough, or wide enough apart, to prevent that—but the meeting would be by his, not Millman's, appointment.

And then he had passed out of the more critical danger zone, and got further east. But, even then, he had taken no chances. Dave Henderson was dead—the creation of one Barty Lynch was not a matter to be trifled with. He had taken no chances; if anything, he had erred on the side of extreme caution. The abrupt transition into respectability by one in misfitting, threadbare garments, and who looked, moreover, a disreputable tramp from his nights in the boxcars, was only to invite suspicion at any ordinary store where he might attempt to buy clothes. A second-hand suit, therefore, of fairly creditable appearance, first replaced Nicolo Capriano's discarded garments; later, at a more exclusive establishment still further east, in Chicago, to be exact, this was exchanged for the attire he now wore—while, here and there, he had stocked a dress-suit case with needed requirements. He had been deliberately leisurely in his progress east once he had felt it safe to dispense with his boxcar mode of travel—and this, actually, as a sort of defiance and challenge flung down by his common sense to that jeering prod with which Millman, and Millman's cynical rendezvous, plagued him in spite of himself. The evening of June twenty-fourth at the St. Lucian Hotel in New York was of no particular interest to him! It had taken him a week to reach Chicago. It was nine days now since he had left Nicolo Capriano's house. Nine days! He was now in New York, standing here on one of the station platforms—and it was the evening of the twenty-fourth of June!

He looked at his watch, as he made his way to the main section of the station. It was seven-thirty. He deposited his dress-suit case in the parcel-room, and went out to the street. Here, he asked a policeman to direct him to the St. Lucian Hotel.

He smiled a little grimly as he walked along. The much vaunted challenge of his common sense had gone down to rout and defeat, it seemed! He was on his way now to the St. Lucian Hotel—and he would be there at eight o'clock on the evening of June twenty-fourth. He laughed outright at himself, suddenly, mirthlessly.

Well, why not! And why not be entirely honest with himself? Despite self-argument to the contrary, he knew all along that he would be at the rendezvous at the appointed time. He was a fool—undoubtedly a fool. Nothing could come of it except, possibly, to afford Millman, if Millman had elected to watch from some safe vantage point in hiding, an amusing spectacle.

He was a fool—he offered nothing in defense of himself on that score. But, too, as far as any results had been obtained, he had been a fool to go searching the old pigeon-cote for the money, when he had beforehand already persuaded himself in his own mind that the money was gone! It was the same thing over again now—the elimination of doubt, that would always have crept insidiously into his mind; the substitution of doubt, however ill-founded, for an established certainty. He had felt better for that visit to the old pigeon-cote; he would feel better, even at the expense of pampering again to fantastic doubts, for his visit to the St. Lucian Hotel to-night. Millman would not be there, any more than the money had been in the pigeon-cote; but, equally, he, Dave Henderson, would have established that fact beyond the reach of any brain quibbling which, of late, had been, it seemed, so prone to affect him.

He stopped again to ask directions from an officer, and to ask this time another question as well—a question prompted by a somewhat unpleasant possibility which, having once decided to keep the rendezvous, he could not now ignore. What kind of a place was this St. Lucian Hotel?

“One of the best,” the officer answered. “There you are—two blocks ahead, and one to the left.”

Dave Henderson smiled with a sort of patient tolerance at himself. The locality alone should have been sufficient answer to his question. It was not the setting, very far from it, for a trap! His hand, that had un consciously closed around the stock of his revolver in the side pocket of his coat, was withdrawn and swung now at his side, as he walked along again.

He looked at his watch once more, as he turned the corner indicated. It was five minutes to eight. A half block ahead of him he saw the hotel. He walked slowly now, the short distance remaining. “The St. Lucian Hotel. Eight o'clock in the evening. June twenty-fourth.” The words seemed to mock at him now, and the gibe to sting. He had fallen for it, after all! He could call himself a fool again if he wished, but what was the use of that? It was obvious that he was a fool! He felt like one, as he passed a much bedecked functionary at the doorway, and found himself standing a moment later in the huge, luxuriously appointed rotunda of the hotel. He was not even recompensed by novelty, as he stared aimlessly about him. It was just the usual thing—the rug-strewn, tiled floor; the blaze of lights; the hum of talk; the hurry of movement; the wide, palm-dotted corridors, whose tables were crowded with men and women in evening dress at after-dinner coffee; the deep lounging chairs in his more immediate vicinity; the strains of an orchestra trying to make itself heard above the general hubbub.

A clock from the hotel desk behind him began to chime the hour. He turned mechanically in that direction, his eyes seeking the timepiece—and whirled suddenly around again, as a hand fell upon his shoulder. The police! The thought flashed swift as a lightning stroke through his mind. Somewhere, somehow he had failed, and they had found him out, and——

The rotunda, the lights, seemed to swirl before him, and then to vanish utterly, and leave only a single figure to fill all the space, a figure in immaculate evening clothes, a figure whose hand tightened its shoulder-grip upon him, a figure whose clear, gray eyes stared into his and smiled.

He touched his lips with the tip of his tongue.

“Millman!” he said hoarsely. “You!”

“Well,” said Millman easily, “this is the St. Lucian Hotel; it's eight o'clock, and June twenty-fourth—who did you expect to meet here?”

“You,” said Dave Henderson—and laughed unnaturally.

Millman's gray eyes narrowed, and his face clouded suddenly.

“What's the matter with you, Dave?” he demanded sharply.

Dave Henderson's hands, at his sides, were clenched. Millman—this was Millman! Millman, whom he hadn't expected to meet here! Millman, whom he had promised himself he would track down if it took a lifetime, and, once found, would settle with as he would settle with a mad dog! And Millman was here, smiling into his face! His mind groped out through a haze of bewilderment that robbed him of the power to reason; his tongue groped for words. It was as though he were dazed and groggy from a blow that had sent him mentally to his knees. He did not understand.

“There's nothing the matter with me,” he said mechanically.

He felt Millman's hand close on his arm.

“Come on up to my rooms,” said Millman quietly. “It's a little public here, isn't it?”

Dave Henderson did not disengage his arm from the other's hold, but his hand slipped unostentatiously into his coat pocket. A rift seemed to come breaking through that brain fog, as he silently accompanied Millman to the elevator. He had dismissed the probability of such a thing but a few minutes before, had even jeered at himself for considering it, but, in spite of the eminent respectability of the St. Lucian Hotel, in spite of its fashion-crowded corridors and lobby, the thought was back now with redoubled force—and it came through the process of elimination. If Millman was a crook, as he undoubtedly was, and had secured the money, as he undoubtedly had, why else should Millman be here? There seemed to be no other way to account for Millman having kept the rendezvous. Strange things, queer things, had happened in hotels that were quite as enviable of reputation as the St. Lucian—perhaps it was even the safest place for such things to happen, from the perpetrator's standpoint! His lips were tight now. Well, at least, he was not walking blindfold into—a trap!

They had ascended in silence. He eyed Millman now in cool appraisal, as the elevator stopped, and the other led the way and threw open the door to a suite of rooms. There was quite a difference between the prison stripes of a bare few months ago and the expensive and fashionably tailored evening clothes of to-night! Well, Millman had always claimed he was a gentleman, hadn't he? And he, Dave Henderson, had believed him—once! But that did not change anything. Millman was no less a crook for that! From the moment Millman had gone to that pigeon-cote and had taken that money, he stood out foursquare as a crook, and—— Dave Henderson felt his muscles tauten, and a chill sense of dismay seize suddenly upon him. There was still another supposition—one that swept upon him now in a disconcerting flash. Suppose Millman had not gone to that pigeon-cote, suppose it was not Millman who had taken the money, suppose that, after all, it had been found by some one else, that Tooler, for instance, had stumbled upon it by chance! And, instead of Millman having it, suppose that it was gone forever, without clue to its whereabouts, beyond his, Dave Henderson's, reach! It was not impossible—it was not even improbable. His brain was suddenly in turmoil—he scarcely heard Millman's words, as the other closed the door of the suite behind them.

“The family is in the country for the summer months,” said Millman with a smile, as he waved his hand around the apartment; “and I have gone back to my old habit—since I have been free to indulge my habits—of living here during that time, instead of keeping a town house open, too. Sit down there, Dave, by the table, and make yourself comfortable.”

It sounded plausible—most plausible! Dave Henderson scowled. Across his mind flashed that scene in the prison library when Millman had been plausible before—damnably plausible! His mind was in a sort of riot now; but, through the maze of doubt and chaos, there stood out clearly enough the memory of the hours, and days, and weeks of bitter resolve to “get” this man who now, offensively at his ease, and smiling, was standing here before him.

And then Dave Henderson laughed a little—not pleasantly.

Well, he was face to face with Millman now. It would be a showdown anyhow. Trap, or no trap, Millman would show his hand. He would know whether Millman had got that money, or whether somebody else had! He would know whether Millman was straight—or whether Millman was a crook!

He jerked his shoulders back sharply; his fingers closed a little more ominously on the revolver in his coat pocket. Was he quite crazy? Had he lost all sense of proportion? The chances were a thousand to one that it was Millman who had looted the pigeon-cote; the chances were one in a thousand that it could have been any one else.

“Yes,” he said coolly. “Nice rooms you've got here, and a bit of a change from—out West!” He jerked his head abruptly toward a door across the room. “I notice you've got a closed door there. I hope I'm not butting in, if you're entertaining friends, or anything like that!” He laughed again—raucously now. His nerves seemed suddenly to be raw and on edge. Millman was favoring him with what, whether it was genuine or not, was meant for a blank stare.

“Friends?” said Millman questioningly. And then his gray eyes softened. “Oh, I see!” he exclaimed. “It's hard to get over the habit, isn't it? No; there's no one there. But perhaps you'd feel better satisfied to look for yourself.”

“I would!” said Dave Henderson bluntly.

“Go ahead, then!” invited Millman readily, and waved his hand toward the door.

“I'll follow you,” said Dave Henderson curtly.

Millman turned toward the door, hesitated, and stopped.

“Dave, what's the matter with you?” he demanded for the second time.

“Nothing much!” replied Dave Henderson. “But we'll get this over first, eh? Go on, let's see the rest' of this suite of yours. It's good to know that an old pal is enjoying such pleasant surroundings.”

Without a word, Millman stepped across the room, and opened the door in question. It led into a bedroom, and from there to a bathroom; there was nothing else. Dave Henderson inspected these in silence. He eyed Millman, frowning in a renewed perplexity, as they returned to the outer room.

“All right!” he said gruffly. “You win the first trick. But how about a certain little package now? I'll trouble you to hand that over, Millman!”

Millman shook his head in a sort of tolerant expostulation.

“As we used to say 'out there,' I don't get you, Dave!” he said slowly. “You are acting very strangely. I've been looking forward to this meeting—and you haven't even a handshake for an old friend. I don't understand.”

“I don't myself!” returned Dave Henderson evenly. “There's a whole lot of things that don't fit. But it's five years since I've seen that package, and maybe I'm a trifle over-anxious about it. Suppose you come across with it!”

Millman shrugged his shoulders a little helplessly.

“You're a queer card, Dave,” he said. “Of course, I'll come across with it! What else in the world are we here for to-night?” He stepped to the table, pulled a drawer open, and produced a neatly tied parcel, which he laid on the table. “I took it out of the vault to-day, so as to have it ready for you to-night.”

From the package, Dave Henderson's eyes lifted, and held Millman's in a long stare. It was as though, somehow, the ground had been swept from under his feet. He had expected anything but the package. Logically, from every conclusion based on logic, Millman should not be handing over that package now. And this act now was so illogical that he could account for it on no other basis than one of trickery of some sort. He tried to read the riddle in the other's eyes; he read only a cool, imperturbable composure. His hand still toyed with the revolver in his pocket.

“There's an outside wrapper on it, I see,” he said in a low voice. “Take it off, Millman.”

Millman's brows knitted in a sort of amused perplexity.

“You're beyond me to-night, Dave,” he said, as he stripped off the outer covering. “Utterly beyond me! Well, there you are!”

The package lay there now on the table, intact, as it had been on the night it had found a hiding-place in the old pigeon-cote. The original brown-paper wrapper was still tied and sealed with its several bank seals in red wax; the corner, torn open in that quick, hasty examination in Martin K. Tydeman's library, still gaped apart, disclosing the edges of the banknotes within. It was the package containing one hundred thousand dollars, intact, untouched, undisturbed.

Dave Henderson sat down mechanically in the chair behind him that was drawn up close to the table. His hand came from his pocket, and, joined by the other, cupped his chin, his elbows resting on the table's edge, as he stared at the package.

“I'm damned!” said Dave Henderson heavily.

His mind refused to point the way. It left him hung up in midair. It still persisted in picturing the vengeance he had sworn against this man here, in picturing every stake he owned flung into the ring to square accounts with this man here—and the picture took on the guise now of grotesque and gigantic irony. But still he did not understand. That picture had had its inception in a logical, incontrovertible and true perspective. It was strange! He looked up now from the package to Millman, as he felt Millman's hand fall and press gently upon his shoulder. Millman was leaning toward him over the table.

“Well, Dave,” said Millman, and his smile disarmed his words, “you've treated me as though I were a thug up to the moment I opened that package, and now you act as though the sight of it had floored you. Perhaps you'll tell me now, if I ask you again, what's the matter?”

Dave Henderson did not answer for a moment. His hand went into his pocket and came out again—with his revolver balanced in its palm.

“I guess I made a mistake,” he said at last, with a queer smile. “Thug is right! I was figuring on pulling this on you—in another way.”

Millman drew a chair deliberately up to the opposite side of the table, and sat down.

“Go on, Dave,” he prompted quietly. “I'm listening.”

Dave Henderson restored the weapon to his pocket, and shrugged his shoulders in a way that was eloquent of his own perturbed state of mind.

“I guess you'll get the point in a word or two,” he said slowly. “The story you told me in the pen, and the way you acted for two years made me believe you, and made me think you were straight. Understand? And then that afternoon before you were going out, and I was up against it hard—you know—I told you where this money was. Understand? Well, I had hardly got back to my cell when I figured you had trapped me. If you were straight you wouldn't touch that money, unless to do me in by handing it back to the police, for it would be the same thing as stealing it again, and that would make a crook of you; if you were a crook then you weren't playing straight with me to begin with, since the story you told me was a lie, and the only reason I could see for that lie was to work me up to spilling the beans so that you could cop the loot and give me the slip. Either way, it looked raw for me, didn't it? Well, when I got out, the money hadn't gone back to the police, but it had gone! I swore I'd get you. Don't make any mistake about that, Millman—I swore I'd get you. I didn't expect to meet you here to-night. I called myself a fool even for coming. You were either straight or a crook, and there wasn't much room left for doubt as to which it was. See, Millman?”

Millman nodded his head gravely.

“I see,” he said, in the same quiet tones. “And now?”

Dave Henderson jerked his hand toward the package of banknotes that lay on the table before him.

“I guess that's the answer, isn't it?” he said, with a twisted smile. “There's the hundred thousand dollars there that you pinched from the old pigeon-cote.” He shoved out his hand impulsively to Millman. “I'm sorry, Millman. Shake! I've been in wrong all the time. But I never seemed to get that slant on it before; that you were—a straight crook.”

Millman's gray eyes, half amused, half serious, studied Dave Henderson for a long minute, as their hands clasped.

“A straight crook, eh?” he said finally, leaning back again in his chair. “Well, the deduction is fairly logical, Dave, I'll have to admit. And what's the answer to that?”

Dave Henderson jerked his hand toward the package of banknotes again.

“There's only one, isn't there?” he returned. “You've got a stake in that coin now. A fair share of it is yours, and I'll leave it to you to say what you want.”

Millman lighted a cigarette before he answered.

“All right!” he said, with a curious smile, as his eyes through the spiral of blue smoke from the tip of his cigarette fixed on Dave Henderson again. “All right! I'll accept that offer, Dave. And I'll take—all, or none.”

Dave Henderson drew sharply back in his chair. There was something in Millman's voice, a significance that he did not like, or quite understand, save that it denied any jocularity on Millman's part, or that the other was making a renunciation of his claim through pure generosity. His eyes narrowed. The money was here. Millman had come across with it. Those facts were not to be gainsaid; but they were facts so utterly at variance with what months of brooding over the matter had led him to expect they should be, that he had accepted them in a sort of stunned surprise. And now this! Was he right, after all—that there was some trickery here?

“What do you mean—all, or none?” he said, a hint of menace creeping into his voice.

“Just that,” said Millman, and his tones were low and serious now. “Just what I said—all, or none.”

Dave Henderson laughed shortly.

“Then I guess it'll be—none!” he said coolly.

“Perhaps,” admitted Millman slowly. “But I hope not.” He leaned forward now, earnestly, over the table. “Dave,” he said steadily, “let us get back to the old pal days again when we believed in each other, just man to man, Dave; because now you've got a chip on your shoulder. I don't want to knock that chip off; I want to talk to you. I want to tell you why I committed what you have rightly called theft in going to that pigeon-cote and taking that money. And I want to try and make you understand that my life in prison and the story that I told you there, in spite of the fact that I have 'stolen' the money now, was not a lie. There is not a soul on this wide earth, Dave, except yourself, who knows that Charles Millman served two years in the penitentiary with prison stripes on his back. If it were known I think it would mean ruin to me, certainly in a social sense, very probably in a commercial sense as well. And yet, Dave, I would rather you knew it than that you didn't. Does that sound strange? Well, somehow, I've never pictured the flaring headlines that would be in every paper in this city if I were exposed—because, well, because I couldn't picture it—not through you, Dave—and that's the only way it could come about. And so you see, Dave, I did not ask you for faith in me without reposing my own faith in you in the same full measure.”

Dave Henderson's brows gathered. He stared at the other. It was like the Charlie Millman of old talking now. But the whole business was queer—except that the money lay here now within reach of his hand after five years of hell and torture. He made no comment.

“And so, Dave, what could I do?” Millman went on. “As far as I could see then, and as far as I can see now, I had no choice but to offer to get that money from its hiding-place. I knew you meant literally what you said when you swore you'd fight for it if all the police in America were blocking your way, and that you'd either get it or go down and out. I knew you'd do that; I knew the police would watch you, and I feared for you either physical harm or another long prison sentence. And so I took the money and shared your guilt. But, Dave, once I was committed to that act, I was committed to another as well—I hadn't any choice there, either—I mean, Dave, the return of the money to the estate where it belongs.”

Dave Henderson was on his feet. His face, that had softened and relaxed as Millman was speaking, was suddenly hard and set again, and now a red, angry flush was dyeing his cheeks. He choked for his words.

“What's that you say!” he rasped out. “Return it!” He laughed raucously. “Have you been drinking, Millman—or are you just crazy?”

A strange, whimsical smile crept to Millman's lips. “No,” he said. “I guess I'm what you called me—just a straight crook. I can't see any other way out, Dave. I've stolen the money too, and it's up to me as well as you. It's got to go back.”

“By God—no!” said Dave Henderson through his teeth. “No! You understand—no!”

Millman shook his head slowly.

“Dave, it's no good,” he said quietly. “Apart from every other consideration, it won't get you anywhere. Listen, Dave, I——”

“No!” Dave Henderson interrupted savagely. “You can cut that out! You're going to preach; but that's no good, either! You're going to pull the goody-goody stuff, and then you're going to tell me that sooner or later I'll be caught, anyhow. Well, you can forget it—the preaching, because I don't want to listen to you; and the other, because there's nothing to it now.” He leaned across the table, and laughed raucously again, and stared with cynical humor at the other. “I'm dead—see? Dave Henderson is dead. A friend of mine pulled the trick on them in 'Frisco. They think Dave Henderson is dead. The book is closed, slammed shut forever—understand? I'm dead—but I've got this money now that I've fought for, and paid for with the sweat of hell, and it's going to pay me back now, Millman! Understand? It's going to pay the dividends now that I've earned—and that, by God, no man is going to take away from me!”

“Good old Dave!” said Millman softly. “That's what's the matter with you—you'd drop in your tracks before you'd let go. If only you weren't looking through the wrong glasses, Dave, you'd fight just as hard the other way. No, I don't want to preach to you, and I'm not going to preach; but there's a great big bond, two years of prison together, between you and me, and I want you to listen to me. You were never meant for a crook, Dave. There's not a crooked thing in the world about you, except this one distorted brain kink that's got hold of you. And now you're in wrong. Look at it from any angle that you like, and it doesn't pay. It hasn't paid you so far—and it never will.”

“Hasn't it!” snapped Dave Henderson. “Well, maybe not! But that's because it hasn't had the chance. But the chance is here now, and it's all bust wide open. You can forget everything else, Millman, except just this, and then you'll understand once for all where I stand: Here's the money—and I'm dead!”

“Your soul isn't,” said Millman bluntly.

Dave Henderson's jaws set.

“That's enough!” he flung out curtly. “Once for all—no!”

Millman did not answer for a moment, nor did he look at Dave Henderson—his eyes, through the curling cigarette smoke, were fixed on the package of banknotes.

“I'm sorry, Dave,” he said at last, in a low, strained way. “I'm sorry you won't take the biggest chance you'll ever have in your life, the chance you've got right now, of coming across a white man clean through. I thought perhaps you would. I hoped you would, Dave—and so I'm sorry. But that doesn't alter my position any. The money has got to go back to the estate, and it is going back.”

For an instant Dave Henderson did not move, then he thrust his head sharply forward over the table. The red had flooded into his face again, and his eyes were hard and full of menace.

“That's better!” he said through tight lips. “You're talking a language now that I understand! So that money is going back, is it? Well, you've talked a lot, and I've listened. Now you listen to me, and listen hard! I don't want to hurt you, Millman, as God is my judge, I don't want to hurt you, but it will be one or the other of us. Understand, Millman? One or the other of us, if you start anything like that! You get me, Millman? You've called a showdown, and that goes; but, by God, unless you've got a better hand than I have, you'll never send that money back!”

Millman's hand was resting on the package of banknotes. He pushed it now quietly across the table to Dave Henderson.

“Not this, Dave,” he said simply. “You settled that when I asked for all or none. This is yours—to do with as you like. Don't misunderstand me, Dave; don't make any mistake. You can put that package under your arm and leave here this minute, and I'll not lift a finger to stop you, or, after you are gone, say a word, or make any move to discredit your assumed death, or bring the police upon your heels. I told you once, Dave—do you remember?—that you could trust me. But, Dave, if you won't return the stolen money, then I will. I haven't any choice, have I? I stole it, too.”

Dave Henderson stared, frowning, into the steel-gray eyes across the table.

“I don't get you!” he said shortly. “What do you mean?”

“Just what I say, Dave,” Millman answered. “That if you won't return it yourself, I will pay it back out of my own pocket.”

For a minute Dave Henderson eyed the other incredulously, then he threw back his head and laughed, but it was not a pleasant laugh.

“You will, eh!” he said. “Well, if you feel that way about it, go to it! Maybe you can afford it; I can't!”

“Yes,” said Millman soberly, “as far as that goes, I am a rich man, and I can afford it. But, Dave, I want to say this to you”—he was standing up now—“the richest man in the world couldn't afford to part with a nickel as well as you could afford to part with that hundred thousand dollars there. It isn't money that you've got at stake, Dave. Well, that's all. Either you pay—or I do. It's up to you, Dave.”

Dave Henderson's hands were clenching and unclenching, as he gripped at the edge of the table. Vaguely, dimly, he sensed an awakening something within him which seemed to be striving to give birth to some discordant element that sought to undermine and shake his resolution. It was not tangible yet, it was confused; his mind groped out in an effort to grasp it in a concrete way so that he might smother it, repudiate it, beat it down.

“No!” he shot out.

Millman shook his head.

“I don't ask you for an answer to-night,” he said gravely. “I don't think you're ready to give an answer now, and be fair to yourself. It's a pretty big stake, Dave. You'll never play for a bigger—and neither will I. I'm staking a hundred thousand dollars on the Dave Henderson I know—the chap that's dead for a while. It doesn't matter much now whether the money is back in the hands of the estate in a day, or a week, or a month from now. Take a month, Dave. If at the end of a month the estate has not received the money from you—and I shall know whether it has or not—it will receive a hundred thousand dollars in cash from me, anonymously, with the statement that it is to square the account for which Dave Henderson was convicted.”

Dave Henderson raised a clenched hand, and swept it, clenched, across his eyes. He had it now! He understood that thing within him that seemed quite as eager to offer battle as he was to give it. And it was strong, and insidious, and crafty. He cursed at it. It took him at a disadvantage. It placed him suddenly on the defensive—and it angered him. It placed him in a position that was not a nice one to defend. He cursed at it; and blind fury came as his defense. And the red that had surged into his face left it, and a whiteness came, and his lips thinned into a straight line.

“Damn you, Millman!” he whispered hoarsely. “I get you now! Damn you, you've no right to put the screws on me like this! Who asked you to offer your money as a sacrifice for me—to make me out a white-livered cur if I turned you down! But it doesn't go, understand? It's blackmail, that's what it is! It may be whitewashed with holiness, but it's blackmail just the same—and you can go to hell with it!”

He snatched up the package of banknotes, whipped the outer wrapping around it, and tucked it under his arm—and paused, as though awaiting or inviting some action on Millman's part. But Millman neither moved nor spoke. And then Dave Henderson, with a short laugh, crossed to the door, wrenched it open, stepped out of the room, and slammed the door behind him.