"Are you making us overtures to join you in passing bad money?"
demanded young Jack.

"Not bad money," returned Lenoir, "very good money--all my own make."

"It is very evident that you do not know us," said Harry Girdwood, "and
so are considerably mistaken. Why you have brought us here and placed
yourself in our power, it is utterly beyond me to understand."

Lenoir stared.

"What!"

"The position is most embarrassing," said Jack. "To do our duty would
be to repay by great ingratitude your kindness in guiding us about the
town, for we ought to denounce you to the police authorities."

This speech partook of the nature of a threat and Pierre Lenoir was up
in an instant.

"The worst day's work of your life would be that," he said, fiercely.
"No man plays traitor to Pierre Lenoir a second time."

"Traitor is a wrong term," said Jack; "we are not sworn to share such
confidences as yours. We shall leave you now, but----"

"Stop!"

They were moving towards the entrance when Lenoir sprang before them,
and whipped out a brace of revolvers.

The position grew exciting and unpleasant.

"Stand out of the way, and let us pass," exclaimed Jack, impetuously.

"Don't come any nearer," said Lenoir, with quiet determination, "for I
warn you that it would be dangerous. You can't move from this place
until you have made terms with me."

"I for one will have nothing whatever to say to you," said Jack,
haughtily. "I don't care to bargain with a coiner."

With his old foolhardy way he was stepping forward, in peril of his
very life.

Lenoir was a desperate man, in a desperate strait.

His finger trembled upon the trigger.

"Stand back, on your life."

"You stand aside," cried Jack.

"Another step and I fire!" cried Lenoir.

"Bah!"

Jack pushed on.

Lenoir pulled the trigger.

Bang it went.

But the ball whistled harmlessly over Jack's head, and lodged in the
slanting roof.

A friendly hand from behind the coiner had knocked up his arm in the
very nick of time.

At the self-same instant some eight or ten men, fully armed, burst into
the vault.

One of them, who was apparently in command, pointed to Lenoir, and said
to the others--

"Arrest that man. He's the leader of them."

And before the coiner could offer any resistance, they knocked his
weapons from his hands, and fell upon him.

But Lenoir was a powerful fellow--a desperate, determined man, and not
so easily disposed of.

With wonderful ene