“He ought to have sent me more provisions to-day, and more tobacco; and it is nightfall and no sign of any one.”

The next day and the next passed in the same fashion.

By this time Halloran had become thoroughly exasperated.

“This settles the bill,” he muttered; “I leave this place to-night.  I do not see much need of staying here any longer, anyhow.  Armstrong will not last many hours longer; he couldn’t; it’s beyond human physical possibility.”

In the semi-twilight he looked in at his prisoner.

Lester had fallen into so deep a sleep that he seemed scarcely to breathe, and the dim, fading light falling in through the chinks of the boarded window gave his face, which was beginning to grow pale because of his confinement, an unusually grayish pallor at this twilight hour.

“Ha! ha!” muttered Halloran, setting his teeth hard together; “it is perfectly safe to leave him now.  He is dying; his hour has come at last.”

Turning on his heel he strode into the outer apartment, banging the door to after him, but not taking the trouble to lock it on this occasion.

“As there seems to be little need of my remaining here longer, now that he is done for, I’m off for the city,” he muttered; “and a pretty tramp I’ll have of it over this barren country road, fully seven miles to the railway station, and hungry as a bear at that.”

Again he looked at Lester, to assure himself beyond all possibility of a doubt that he was actually dying.

And again he was thoroughly deceived.

“It’s all over with him,” he muttered, “and Kendale’s secret is safe between him and me, and he’ll have to pay me handsomely to keep it; that’s certain.”

On the threshold he halted.

“Dead men tell no tales,” he muttered, “and he would be past all recognition by the time any one came across him in this isolated spot.  Then, again, some one might happen to wander this way.

“It’s best to be sure; to put it beyond human power to discover his identity, and the only way to secure that end is to burn this place.  Ay! that is the surest and safest way to effectually conceal the crime.”

He had muttered the words aloud, and they fell distinctly upon the ears of Lester Armstrong, who had awakened at the sound of his footsteps the second time, although he had given no sign of having done so.  The words fell with horrible dread upon his ears because of the fact that he was bound hand and foot by an iron chain, fastened to a heavy ring in the floor.

For the last week he had used every endeavor to force the links apart, but they had frustrated his most strenuous efforts.

And he said to himself, if the fiend incarnate before him carried out his intention of firing the place it would be all over with him.  The horrible smoke would assuredly suffocate him ere he could, even by exerting the most Herculean strength, succeed in liberating himself.