nce's abode and Laurence himself came out to
meet them.

"Well?" said Hipps.

But Laurence shook his head.

"Nothing doing at present."

"Has he had any food?"

"Not today. He's weak enough in all conscience."

"Sleep?"

"Damn little. He dropped off two or three times and I got the chaps to
spray him with cold water. That kept him lively. Blayney and Parker
are sleeping in the room now and taking shifts to watch him at night.
Awfully sorry, you two, but I've done my best."

"I'll get right up," said Ezra P. Hipps. "Say, Auriole'll be along
presently. Tell her to stand by. She may come in useful."

He marched heavily up the stairs and entered Richard's room.

Blayney was on duty sprawling watchful on a camp bed, his elbows
propped on a kit bag.

"Get out, you," said Hipps, and the man obeyed. Then he turned to
Richard.

The last few days had wrought a desperate change in his looks. Caverns
had sunk in his cheeks and his eyes were ringed with black. That he
stood in earnest need of a shave heightened the pallor of brow and
temples.

He was seated, cramped rather, in an upright chair with chin down. His
left hand beat a tattoo on the table top and he sucked the thumb of his
right hand like a badly trained child at a make-belief meal.

"Taste good?" asked Hipps. "If I'd known you'd a fancy that way I'd
have brought along a soother."

Richard removed his thumb and said, "Go to Hell!" very distinctly.

Hipps walked a few paces toward him and remarked:

"Still pretty fresh, I see."

"Leaking badly, but still afloat," came the reply.

"Durn me! but you're a sound citizen, Bud. I respect sand but I
despise a fool."

"All right you do," mumbled Richard sleepily.

"Pretty tired?"

"Not sufficiently wide awake to listen to your talk, damn you!"

The American smiled nastily.

"Maybe not, but this is a case of having to. Say! ever been in one of
those big machine shops and seen a giant flywheel swizzling round at
three hundred revs. a minute? Guess you wouldn't be gink enough to put
out a hand and try to stop it. Never saw any machine yet that develops
more power than I can."

Richard shrugged a shoulder; it was too great an effort to shrug both
of them.

"And I guess you ain't going to stop the fly-wheel of my destiny."

"You've had a sample," he replied with a touch of spirit.

Hipps came a step closer and hooked his foot round a leg of Richard's
chair.

"Know anything about