when we paused at the door
for a preliminary survey, the bar was lined with drinkers, and groups of
twos and threes were slowly sauntering here and there or conversing at
the tops of their voices with many guffaws. The air was thick with
tobacco smoke. Johnny stepped just inside the door, moved sideways, and
so stood with his back to the wall. His keen eyes went from group to
group slowly, resting for a moment in turn on each of the five impassive
gamblers and their lookouts, on the two barkeepers, and then one by one
on the men with whom the place was crowded. Following his, my glance
recognized at a corner of the bar Danny Randall with five rough-looking
miners. He caught my eye and nodded. No one else appeared to notice us,
though I imagined the noise of the place sank and rose again at the
first moment of our entrance.

"Jim," said Johnny to me quietly, "there's Danny Randall at the other
end of the room. Go join him. I want you to leave me to play my own
game."

I started to object.

"Please do as I say," insisted Johnny. "I can take care of myself unless
there's a general row. In that case all my friends are better together."

Without further protest I left him, and edged my way to the little group
at the end of the bar. Randall nodded to me as I came up, and motioned
to the barkeeper to set me out a glass, but said nothing. Ours was the
only lot away from the gaming tables not talking. We sipped our drink
and watched Johnny.

After surveying coolly the room, Johnny advanced to the farther of the
gambling tables, and began to play. His back was toward the entrance.
The game was roulette, and Johnny tossed down his bets methodically,
studying with apparent absorption each shift of the wheel. To all
appearance he was intent on the game, and nothing else; and he talked
and laughed with his neighbours and the dealer as though his spirit were
quite carefree.

For ten minutes we watched. Then a huge figure appeared in the blackness
of the doorway, slipped through, and instantly to one side, so that his
back was to the wall. Scar-face Charley had arrived.

He surveyed the place as we had done, almost instantly caught sight of
Johnny, and immediately began to make his way across the room through
the crowds of loungers. Johnny was laying a bet, bending over the table,
joking with the impassive dealer, his back turned to the door, totally
oblivious of his enemy's approach. I started forward, instantly realized
the