shrank from sure death in such a cause. For
fully twenty seconds they faced each other in the glaring light of the
saloon, pent up passion visible in the one, invisible in the other. In
Dirke's face, and bearing, however, devoid as it was of any emotion, one
quality was but the more recognizable for that, and the count knew that
the man before him was available as an antagonist.

"Monsieur," he said, with strong self-control, "it is possible that you
do not understand--that you are not aware--that--Monsieur! The ring
which you are pleased to wear so--so--conspicuously is the property
of--The ring, Monsieur, is sacred to me!"

"Sacred!" Dirke repeated. "Sacred!" The word was an arraignment, not to
be overlooked.

"Monsieur!" the count cried.

"I was merely struck by your peculiar treatment of sacred things," Dirke
replied, his tone dropping to the level of absolute indifference. "It
is--unconventional, to say the least."

He lifted his hand and examined the ring with an air of newly aroused
interest. He wondered, half-contemptuously, at the man's self-control.

"Monsieur," he heard him say. "You are a gentleman; I perceive it
beneath the disguise of your vocation,--of your conduct. When I say to
you that the sight of that ring upon your finger compromises my
honor,--that it is an _insult_ to me,--you comprehend; is it not so?"

"Quite so," Dirke replied, with carefully studied offensiveness.

"Then, Monsieur, it will perhaps be possible at another time to correct
the inequality in point of arms to which you have called my attention."
The challenge was admirably delivered.

"I should think nothing could be simpler," Dirke rejoined, and he
deliberately put his pistol in his pocket.

They parted without more words, de Lys stumbling once as he made his way
along the uneven sidewalk, Dirke keeping on across the barren upland,
sure-footed and serene.

It had come at last, his great opportunity; all the evil in his nature
was roused at last; jealousy, vindictiveness, unscrupulousness. He
gloated over his own iniquity; every feature of it rejoiced him. He had
no moral right to that ring,--all the dearer his possession of it! This
man had never injured him;--the more delicious his hatred of him. The
Frenchman with his exasperating air of success was to him the insolent
embodiment of that which had been wrongfully wrested from him, Dabney
Dirke, who had as good a right to success as another. Some
philanthropists, mad