to the garage and get
his car and the weapon he had left there. Then, if the four still wanted
to fight, he would show them something that might take the spirit out of
them.

Having arrived at this sane conclusion, he turned away from the silent
house, and, hatless and coatless as he was, hurriedly made his way
through the heavy snow-drifts toward the public road.

CHAPTER XV

MR. SHAW DECIDES TO TALK

At the garage he found Burke faithful to his trust and with an alert eye
out for more five-dollar bills. The proprietor temporarily lost sight of
these, however, in his sudden and vivid interest in the new patron's
appearance.

Laurie answered his questions with a word that definitely checked the
further development of curiosity. Then, huddling over the stove, and
warming his icy, soaked feet, he curtly outlined his intentions. He was
going to change back into his own clothes, he explained, and he would
want his car at five o'clock sharp. This, he intimated, would give Burke
a little more than half an hour in which to get his mental processes
started again and to have the car ready.

Burke whistled inaudibly. Obviously the joke the lad had played had not
panned out to the young man's taste. Burke was sorry for that. His
experience had been that with these young "rounders" generosity went
hand in hand with success and its attendant exhilaration; and that when
depression set in, as it obviously had done in this instance, a sudden
paralysis numbed the open palm.

However, even granting that this was so, he had already been largely
overpaid for anything he had done or might still be expected to do. He
nodded his response to the young man's instructions, and though he was
not a subtle person, he succeeded in conveying at the same time a sense
of his sympathy with the natural annoyance of a high-spirited practical
joker whose joke had plainly miscarried. Ordinarily his attitude would
have amused Devon, but Laurie was far from his sense of humor just now.
Still whistling softly, Burke departed, to make a final inspection of
the car, leaving Laurie the sole occupant of the cramped and railed-in
corner that represented the private office.

That young man was in the grip of a characteristic Devon rage, and as he
rapidly got back into his own clothing his fury mounted until the blood
pounded at his temples. He dared not let himself sum up the case against
Shaw, though the manner in which he had been kicked out sav