, his eyes aflame with hate and passion.

"Keep a-settin', you buzzard's whelp!" he sneered; "keep a-settin'!
Latimer's out to git you. You know it--eh? You've knowed it right
along--pretendin' not to. 'Drag' Harlan--bah! Gunslinger with a
record--an' caught a-settin'. Caught with the goods on, sneakin' in here,
tryin' to ketch a man unawares.

"Bah! Don't I know what you're here for? It's me! You blowed Dolver apart
for killin' that damned, slick-eyed pardner of yourn--Davey Langan. Do
you want to know who sent Langan out? I'm tellin' you--it was me!
Me--me!"

He fairly yelled the last words, and stiffened, holding the fingers of
his right hand clawlike, above the butt of the holstered pistol.

And when he saw that Harlan did not move; that he sat there rigid, his
eyes unblinking and expressionless; his right hand hanging limply at his
side, near the partially extended leg; his left hand resting upon the
thigh of the doubled leg--he stepped closer, watching Harlan's right
hand.

For a space--while one might have counted ten--neither man moved a
muscle. Something in Harlan's manner sent into Latimer's frenzied brain
the message that all was not what it seemed--that Harlan was meditating
some astonishing action. Ten seconds is not long, as times goes, but
during that slight interval the taut nerves of Latimer's were twanged
with a torturing doubt that began to creep over him.

Would Harlan never make that move? That question was dinned insistently
into Latimer's ears. He began to believe that Harlan did not intend to
draw.

And then----

"Ah!"

It was Latimer's lungs that breathed the ejaculation.

For Harlan's right hand had moved slightly upward, toward the pistol at
his right hip. It went only a few inches; it was still far below the
holster when Latimer's clawlike fingers descended to the butt of his own
weapon. The thought that he would beat Harlan in a fair draw was in his
mind--that he would beat him despite the confusion of the hesitating
motion with which Harlan got his gun out.

Something was happening, though--something odd and unexplainable. For
though Latimer had seemed to have plenty of time, he was conscious that
Harlan's gun was belching fire and death at him. He saw the smoke
streaks, felt the bullets striking him, searing their way through him,
choking him, weakening his knees.

He went down, his eyes wide with incredulity, filling with hideous
self-derision when he saw that the pistol w