ished his preparations for the night and was about to turn
out the light, when, with his hand on the electric button, he paused,
for he distinctly heard from downstairs what sounded like a call--a cry.

Taking his revolver from the top drawer, he went into the hall, to feel
a draft of icy air blow up the staircase, to see over the balusters the
open door of the dining-room and light within it, and to hear more
clearly the sounds that had come to him through closed doors declare
themselves to be scuffling--struggling--the half-cry of a muffled
voice--a fall, then Bulstrode started.

"I'm coming," he declared, and ran down the stairs like a boy.

On the dining-room floor, close to the window wide open to the icy
night, lay a man's form, and over him bent another man cruelly, with
all the animus of a bird of prey.

The under man was Ruggles, Bulstrode's butler, his eyes starting from
their sockets, his mouth open, his color livid; he couldn't have called
out, for the other man had seized his necktie, twisted it tight as a
tourniquet around the man's gullet, and so kneeling with one knee on
his chest, Waring held the big man under.

"I say," panted the young man, "can you lend a hand, sir? I've got
him, but I'm not strong enough to keep him."

Bulstrode thought his servant's eyes rolled appealingly at him. He
cocked his revolver, holding it quietly, and asked coolly:

"What's the matter with him that he needs to be kept?"

"Would you sit on his chest, Mr. Bulstrode?"

"No," said that gentleman. "I'll cover him so. What's the truth?"

"I heard a queer noise," panted the Englishman, "and came out to see
what it was, and this fellow was just getting through the window.
There was another chap outside, but he got away. I caught this one
from the back, otherwise I could never have thrown him."

"You're throttling him."

"He deserves it."

"Let him up."

"Mr. Bulstrode...!"

"Yes," said that gentleman, decidedly, "let him up."

But Ruggles, released from the hand whose knuckles had ground
themselves into his windpipe, could not at once rise. The breath was
out of him, for he had been heavily struck in the stomach by a blow
from the fist of a man whose training in sport had delightfully
returned at need.

Ruggles began to breathe like a porpoise, to grunt and pant and roll
over. He staggered to his feet, and with a string of imprecations
raised his fist at Waring, but as Bulstrode's revolver was entirely