Mr. Travis snorted at this, and stamped out of the Tate apartment.

At his exit, doors closed softly on every floor, because the neighbours had listened to the tete-a-tete with intense interest.  Even people in the next house had been able to hear most of it.

Ambrose made his furious way toward the Social Club, his mind set on mortal encounter with the hated Dominique.  But—­here was an inspiration!—­why not win his money away from him first?  To win away his last cent—­to humble him—­to ruin him—­and then to break him in two and kick the pieces through the San Juan causeways, as per programme!  This would be a revenge indeed!

Ambrose noted with satisfaction that Mr. Raffin was already at play, and crossing the smoke-filled room he threw down some money and took his place in the game.

Now, Mr. Travis was ordinarily a very garrulous and vociferous crap shooter, but to-night he was savagely silent.  There was a disturbing, electric something in the air that the neutrals felt and feared.  There was a look in the Travis eye that boded ill for somebody, and one by one the more prudent gamesters withdrew.

Then suddenly the storm broke.

Later accounts were not clear as to just what started the fray, but start it did.

Dominique’s knife appeared from some place, and the table crashed.  Then the knife swished through space like a hornet and buried its point harmlessly in a door across the room.

What followed is still a subject of wondering conversation on San Juan Hill.

It seems that Mr. Travis seized Mr. Raffin by the collar of his coat, and swung him round and round and over his head.  Mr. Raffin streamed almost straight out, like the imitation airplanes that whirl dizzily about the tower in an amusement park.  Suddenly there was a rending of cloth, and Dominique shot through the air to encounter the wall with a soul-satisfying thump.

Ambrose looked bewildered at the torn clothing he held in his hand, and then at the limp form of his late antagonist.  Mr. Raffin lay groaning, naked from the waist up.

Ambrose strode across to administer further chastisement, but was halted by a cry from one of the onlookers.  This man stood pointing at Dominique’s naked back—­pointing, and staring with eyes that rolled with genuine negro terror.

“Look!” gasped the affrighted one.  “Look!  It’s de Voo-doo Eye—­ dat man’s a witch!  Ambrose, fo’ de Lawd’s sake, git away from hyar!”

“What you-all talkin’ about?” scoffed Ambrose, striding closer, and rolling Dominique so that the light shone full on his back.  “What you-all talkin’——­Good Lawd”!

This last ejaculation from Ambrose was caused by the sight that met his gaze.

There, on the yellow back before him, reaching from shoulder to shoulder, was tattooed the likeness of a great human eye!

Everyone saw it now.  To some—­the Northern darkies—­it meant nothing.  But to the old-school Southern negroes it meant mystery—­magic—­death. It was the sign of the Voodoo!