ping. Then I will go back to him with some faked papers. As he is
reading them I will jump for him and get my grip on his pistol arm.
You'll hear me call and in you will rush. The quicker the better; for
he is as strong a man as I, and I may have more than I can manage. But
I allow that I can hold him till you come."

"It's a good plan," said McGinty. "The lodge will owe you a debt for
this. I guess when I move out of the chair I can put a name to the man
that's coming after me."

"Sure, Councillor, I am little more than a recruit," said McMurdo; but
his face showed what he thought of the great man's compliment.

When he had returned home he made his own preparations for the grim
evening in front of him. First he cleaned, oiled, and loaded his Smith
& Wesson revolver. Then he surveyed the room in which the detective was
to be trapped. It was a large apartment, with a long deal table in the
centre, and the big stove at one side. At each of the other sides were
windows. There were no shutters on these: only light curtains which
drew across. McMurdo examined these attentively. No doubt it must have
struck him that the apartment was very exposed for so secret a meeting.
Yet its distance from the road made it of less consequence. Finally he
discussed the matter with his fellow lodger. Scanlan, though a Scowrer,
was an inoffensive little man who was too weak to stand against the
opinion of his comrades, but was secretly horrified by the deeds of
blood at which he had sometimes been forced to assist. McMurdo told him
shortly what was intended.

"And if I were you, Mike Scanlan, I would take a night off and keep
clear of it. There will be bloody work here before morning."

"Well, indeed then, Mac," Scanlan answered. "It's not the will but the
nerve that is wanting in me. When I saw Manager Dunn go down at the
colliery yonder it was just more than I could stand. I'm not made for
it, same as you or McGinty. If the lodge will think none the worse of
me, I'll just do as you advise and leave you to yourselves for the
evening."

The men came in good time as arranged. They were outwardly respectable
citizens, well clad and cleanly; but a judge of faces would have read
little hope for Birdy Edwards in those hard mouths and remorseless
eyes. There was not a man in the room whose hands had not been reddened
a dozen times before. They were as hardened to human murder as a
butcher to sheep.

Foremost, of course, both in appearance