ve you?"

"I sure did, Jim; an' I didn't overdose you, neither. I cooked it in as
neat as you please in your half the porterhouse.--Hold on! Where're you
goin'?"

Jim had made a dash for the door, and was throwing back the bolts. Matt
sprang in between and shoved him away.

"Drug store," Jim panted. "Drug store."

"No you don't. You'll stay right here. There ain't goin' to be any
runnin' out an' makin' a poison play on the street--not with all them
jools reposin' under the pillow. Savve? Even if you didn't die, you'd be
in the hands of the police with a lot of explanations comin'. Emetics is
the stuff for poison. I'm just as bad bit as you, an' I'm goin' to take
a emetic. That's all they'd give you at a drug store, anyway."

He thrust Jim back into the middle of the room and shot the bolts into
place. As he went across the floor to the food shelf, he passed one hand
over his brow and flung off the beaded sweat. It spattered audibly on
the floor. Jim watched agonizedly as Matt got the mustard can and a cup
and ran for the sink. He stirred a cupful of mustard and water and drank
it down. Jim had followed him and was reaching with trembling hands for
the empty cup. Again Matt shoved him away. As he mixed a second cupful,
he demanded:

"D'you think one cup'll do for me? You can wait till I'm done."

Jim started to totter toward the door, but Matt checked him.

"If you monkey with that door, I'll twist your neck. Savve? You can take
yours when I'm done. An' if it saves you, I'll twist your neck, anyway.
You ain't got no chance, nohow. I told you many times what you'd get if
you did me dirt."

"But you did me dirt, too," Jim articulated with an effort.

Matt was drinking the second cupful, and did not answer. The sweat had
got into Jim's eyes, and he could scarcely see his way to the table,
where he got a cup for himself. But Matt was mixing a third cupful, and,
as before, thrust him away.

"I told you to wait till I was done," Matt growled. "Get outa my way."

And Jim supported his twitching body by holding on to the sink, the
while he yearned toward the yellowish concoction that stood for life. It
was by sheer will that he stood and clung to the sink. His flesh strove
to double him up and bring him to the floor. Matt drank the third
cupful, and with difficulty managed to get to a chair and sit down. His
first paroxysm was passing. The spasms that afflicted him were dying
away. This good effect he ascribed to t