ness barred with fierce jets of light, imprisoned by
walls that he could not see, cut off from the free air of open day,
stifled by pungent gases that stung him, throat and eye, he felt an
uncanny oppression, fear of the unknown, fear of the law, most of all
fear of Pierre.

Pierre watched him through his mantle of darkness. He thrust forward his
head, and a bar of light smote him across his open lips. It showed his
gleaming teeth white and shut, his black moustache, his swarthy lips
parted in a sardonic smile; that was all. A horrible grin on a
background of inky black.

Luna shrank.

"Leave off your devil's tricks."

"_Moi?_"

Pierre replaced the bottle of acid on the shelf and picked up a pair of
tongs. As he raised the cover of the glowing crucible a sudden
transformation took place. The upper part of the laboratory blazed out
fiercely, and in this light Pierre moved with gesticulating arms, the
lower part of his body wholly hidden. He lifted the crucible, shook it
for a moment with an oscillatory motion, then replaced it on the fire.
He turned again to Luna.

"Hall ze time I mek ze explain. Hall ze time you mek ze question.
_Comment?_"

Luna's courage was returning in the light.

"You're damned thick-headed, when it suits you, all right. Well, I'll
explain. Last clean-up I brought you two pounds of amalgam if it was an
ounce. All I got out of it was fifty dollars. You said that was my
share. Hansen brought you a chunk of quartz from the mine. He showed it
to me first. If I know gold from sulphur, there was sixty dollars in it.
Hansen got five out of it."

Pierre interrupted.

"You mek mention ze name."

"There's no one to hear in this damned hell of yours."

"_Non_," Pierre answered. "You mek mention in zis hell. Bimby you mek
mention," Pierre gave an expressive upward jerk with his thumb, then
shrugged his shoulders.

"I'll look out for that," Luna answered, impatiently. "I'm after
something else now. I'm getting sick of pinching the mill and bringing
the stuff here for nothing. So are the rest of the boys. We ain't got no
hold on you and you ain't playing fair. You've got to break even or this
thing's going to stop."

Pierre made no reply to Luna. He picked up the tongs, lifted the
crucible from the fire, and again replaced it. Then he brought out an
ingot mould and laid it on a ledge of the furnace. The crucible was
again lifted from the fire, and its contents were emptied in the mould.
Pier