I sees him," admitted the man who had answered the
first question. The other remained dumb.

"Has he been about here to-day?"

"No."

"I'll wait till the operator gets back," announced Brent with a
nonchalance difficult to maintain.

He did not take a seat but stood, studiously appraising the place while
he seemed to see little. After the depression attendant upon Bud's
desertion had followed an almost electric keenness; every gesture was
guarded and every nerve set now against any self-betrayal, for he felt
himself fencing in the dark with wily adversaries.

He sauntered idly over near the door to the baggage-room and beyond its
panels he could hear the scurry of rats at play among loose piles of
boxes and litter.

"Sounds like the rats are having a party in there," he suggested as
though laudibly resolved upon making conversation in a taciturn circle.

"Mebby they be." Still only one of the countrymen had spoken a
syllable.

"I'd like to put a good rat-dog in there and watch him work," laughed
Brent, turning again to face the door as though he found fascination in
the thought. Then idly he laid his hand on the knob as though to try
its opening, but he went no further. Just at the side of the lintel
hung a broken and extremely dirty mirror and a quick glance into its
revealing surface told him a full story. He saw the man with the
pinched features reach swiftly back of him and slide a rifle away from
its concealed place against the wall. He saw the other's hand go
flash-like under his coat and under his left arm-pit. He caught in
both faces a sudden and black malignity which told him, beyond
question, that they would not play but would kill.

Of course too he knew why and he made a point of standing there with
every evidence of having seen nothing or suspected nothing.

After that first glance he also carefully avoided the mirror which
might work revelation to them as well as to himself. Eventually he
turned, not directly toward them but toward the other end of the room
and carelessly walked its length that he might give emphasis to his
unhurried seeming before he came slowly about.

When he did so the two men sat as before. The rifle had already
disappeared. The hand that had swept holster-ward had swept out again.
Both faces were blankly unconcerned.

Brent dropped into a chair near the door and listened as the clatter
inside increased. The rats scrambled about with a multiplicity of
ligh