The faint glimmer of color had passed the door.  It was dissolved in deeper shadows at once, and soundlessly; Lefty knew that Donnegan was closer and closer.

Of one thing he felt more and more confident, that Donnegan did not have his revolver with him.  Otherwise, he would have used it before.  For what was darkness to this devil, Donnegan.  He walked like a cat, and most likely he could see like a cat in the dark.  Instinctively the older tramp braced himself with his right hand held at a guard before his breast and the knife poised in his left, just as a man would prepare to meet the attack of a panther.  He even took to probing the darkness in a strange hope to catch the glimmer of the eyes of Donnegan as he moved to the attack.  If there were a hair’s breadth of light, then Donnegan himself must go down.  A single blow would do it.

But the devil had instructed his favorite Donnegan how to fight.  He did not come lunging through the shadows to meet the point of that knife.  Instead, he had worked a snaky way along the floor and now he leaped in and up at Lefty, taking him under the arms.

A dozen hands, it seemed, laid hold on Lefty.  He fought like a demon and tore himself away, but the multitude of hands pursued him.  They were small hands.  Where they closed they tore the clothes and bit into his very flesh.  Once a hand had him by the throat, and when Lefty jerked himself away it was with a feeling that his flesh had been seared by five points of red-hot iron.  All this time his knife was darting; once it ripped through cloth, but never once did it find the target.  And half a second later Donnegan got his hold.  The flash of the knife as Lefty raised it must have guided the other.  He shot his right hand up behind the left shoulder of the other and imprisoned the wrist.  Not only did it make the knife hand helpless, but by bearing down with his own weight Donnegan could put his enemy in most exquisite torture.

For an instant they whirled; then they went down, and Lefty was on top.  Only for a moment.  The impetus which had sent him to the floor was used by Donnegan to turn them over, and once fairly on top his left hand was instantly at the throat of Lefty.

Twice Lefty made enormous efforts, but then he was done.  About his body the limbs of Donnegan were twisted, tightening with incredible force; just as hot iron bands sink resistlessly into place.  The strangle-hold cut away life at its source.  Once he strove to bury his teeth in the arm of Donnegan.  Once, as the horror caught at him, he strove to shriek for help.  All he succeeded in doing was in raising an awful, sobbing whisper.  Then, looking death in the face, Lefty plunged into the great darkness.

4

When he wakened, he jumped at a stride into the full possession of his faculties.  He had been placed near the open door, and the rush of night air had done its work in reviving him.  But Lefty, drawn back to life, felt only a vague wonder that his life had not been taken.  Perhaps he was being reserved by the victor for an Indian death of torment.  He felt cautiously and found that not only were his hands free, but his revolver had not been taken from him.  A familiar weight was on his chest—­the very knife had been returned to its sheath.