and fainting from sheer loss of blood, turn smiling and give
himself up to the sheriff. He had seen Red Shandon the hero of a crowd
that went wild over him; had heard even MacKelvey's rough voice crying
bluntly, "There's a man for you!"

But anger and hatred, swelling venemously in his heart, had only
hardened him, making him the more determined. He did not doubt, he did
not fear. Not enough had happened to undermine the man's cold,
dominating strength, to alter the essential fact in his mind that he
was Hume and that people who strove against him were fools doomed to
defeat. But before he heard the silken rustle of Helga Strawn's
approach there was to come to him a new sign of the future that was
rushing down upon him.

As usual Helga kept him waiting. He tapped at the window with a hand
that he jerked impatiently from his pocket; he turned, thinking that he
heard her steps; he walked back and forth in the room. And thus it
happened that his eyes fell upon a large sheet of paper lying upon the
table, his own name typed in capitals across the top. His frowning
eyes read the few lines swiftly:

"Your tunnel is already one hundred and fifty-three feet upon Shandon
property. That is far enough."

There was no signature.

A child has an instinctive fear of the dark; the thing a man does not
understand brings from the obscurity of the unknown a certain, vague
dread. Who had written this thing? There was no answer. Why? No
answer. How did it come here, who could have known that Hume would see
it here? No answer. It was as though a warning, taking form from the
invisible air had fallen from the air before his startled eyes.

He swept up the paper, crumpling it in his fingers. He had not heard
Helga Strawn, did not know that she was in the room until she spoke
quietly.

"Is fate relenting? Or are you still playing the losing game?"

He swung upon her sharply. His eyes, glittering and hard, met hers
softly luminous. He had never seen the woman so radiantly, regally
beautiful, perhaps because he had never seen her so keenly alive as she
was to-day. Although his brain was riotous with other things he could
not fail to note the superb carriage, the rich gown daringly
fashionable, the warm whiteness of arms and throat, the finely
chiselled red lips that were unsmiling.

"The losing game?" he cried, coming swiftly toward her, stopping only
when his tall form towered over her. "By God, no! I have los