his feet.

"Sit down!" thundered Mr. Harley, a pistol coming from his pocket like a
flash.

[Illustration: "Sit Down!" Thundered Mr. Harley]

Mr. Harley was from a region where pistols were regarded in the light of
arguments, and gentlemen gravely debating therewith at ten paces had the
approving countenance of the public. This may explain the ready grace
with which Mr. Harley produced a specimen of that species of artillery
when Storri seemed to threaten violence.

"Sit down!" thundered Mr. Harley, and Storri, with terror twitching at
his lips, obeyed. Mr. Harley replaced the pistol in his pocket, and
surveyed Storri with a look so sinister it alarmed that nobleman to the
heart. "I have come," continued Mr. Harley, taking a chair and
maintaining the while a dangerous eye on Storri, "I have come to return
your insults, you blackmailing rogue, in the room where I received
them."

CHAPTER XVIII

HOW STORRI EXPLORED FOR GOLD

Should it ever be your fancy to witness on the part of any gentleman an
exhibition of ferocity unrestrained, that you may have him at his best
for your experiment, it would be wise to commence by subjecting him to a
tremendous fright. Being first frightened and then relieved from his
terror, and particularly if his nature be a trifle rough, he will if
brought suddenly into the presence of one who has injured him furnish
all you could desire in a picture of the sort adverted to. And thus was
it with Mr. Harley that evening when he called on Storri--now no longer
terrible.

The offensive utmost that one gentleman might say to another, Mr. Harley
said to his aforetime noble friend. He crushed Storri beneath fourfold
what bulk of insolence and contumelious remark he himself had received,
for at that fashion of conversation Mr. Harley was Storri's superior.
Mr. Harley rendered Storri such shameful accounts of himself that the
latter was well-nigh consumed with what inward fires were ignited.
Storri burned the more because his own cowardly alarms tied his hands
and gagged retort upon his tongue. Mr. Harley, who had been frightened
to the brink of collapse in the only manner that Storri might have
frightened him, now refreshed himself unchecked and fed retaliation to
the full.

Storri, craven to the roots, must fain submit. The murderous facility
wherewith Mr. Harley in the beginning invested the conversation with
that pistol had not been lost upon Storri, and he shivered lest the
interv