er; and thus
we waited, while the footsteps rapidly drew nearer, in readiness most
effectually to cut off the retreat of whoever might enter the room.

The man who did enter, passing between us, was the Priest Captain. As he
saw the wreck of the idol, and the opening in the wall behind where the
idol had stood, he uttered an exclamation of alarm and rage; and in the
same moment some instinctive dread of the danger that menaced him caused
him to turn suddenly around. So, for an instant, he confronted us--and
never shall I forget the look of malignant hatred that was in his face
as in that instant he regarded us, nor his quick despairing gesture at
sight of Young standing there with his rifle raised. Even as he opened
his mouth to cry out, before any sound came from his lips, the heavy
barrel of Young's rifle swept downward, and with a groan he fell.

Had the blow struck fairly it could not but have split the man's skull
open; but he swerved aside a little as the rifle came down, and the
weight of the stroke, glancing from his head, fell upon his shoulder. In
an instant, dropping the rifle, Young was kneeling on his breast with a
hand buried in the flabby flesh of his old throat, holding tight-gripped
his windpipe. Excepting only Rayburn, Young was the strongest man I ever
knew (though, to be sure, at that time he was weakened by his then
recent wound and by the privations of his imprisonment), yet it was all
that he could do to hold that old man down and to maintain his choking
grasp. With a most desperate energy and a fierce strength that seemed
out of all nature in a creature so lean and old and shrivelled, the
Priest Captain writhed and struggled in his efforts to throw Young off,
and sought also to grasp Young's throat with his long bony hands--while
foam gathered on his thin lips, and his withered brown face grew black
with congested blood, and his black eyes protruded until the half of the
eyeballs, bloody with bursting reins, showed around the black, dilated
pupils. And then him struggles slowly grew less and less violent, his
knotted muscles gradually relaxed, his mouth fell open so that his
tongue lolled out hideously, his legs and arms twitched a little
spasmodically--and then he lay quite still.

[Illustration: YOUNG'S STRUGGLE WITH THE PRIEST CAPTAIN]

For a minute or two longer Young maintained his grasp. Then rising to
his feet, breathing heavily, he wiped the sweat from his face as he
exclaimed, at the