“Maybe that’s all you’ve to say,” he cried, his jaws snapping viciously over his words, his eyes fiercely alight.  “You think you’ve won when you’ve only gained a moment’s respite.  You can’t win.  You don’t know.  Oh, yes.  I guess you can send me along out of the way.  You can do just all you reckon.  And if it suits you, you can shoot me up or any other old thing.  You forget Hellbeam.  You tell me I’m a crook and a blackmailer, you give me credit for nerve and courage.  That’s all right.  You think these things, and I don’t have to worry.  But you’ve robbed Hellbeam.  You’ve robbed him like any common ’hold-up’—­of millions.  It’s not for you to talk of crooks and blackmailers.  The laws of the States are going to find you the crook, and Hellbeam’ll see they don’t err for leniency.  Hellbeam’ll get you as sure as God.  You’ve got months to think it over, and when you’ve done I reckon you won’t fancy shouting.  Well, I’m ready for this joy spot you call No. 10.  I’m not going to kick.  I’ve sense enough to know when the drop’s on me.  But you’ll see me again.  Oh, yes, you’ll see me again because you’re not going to shoot me up.  For all your talk you haven’t the nerve.  You’ll see me again, and when you do—­well, don’t forget Hellbeam’s at the other end of this business.  Guess I’m ready.”

The man stood up.  And as he stood his eyes looked squarely into those of Bat.

“Get on with it,” he cried, and flung the remains of his lighted cigarette on the pile of the carpet, and trod it viciously underfoot with his heavy sea boot.

* * * * *

Standing was alone.  He was alone with the thoughts his encounter with Idepski had inspired.  Judging by the expression of his reflective eyes they were scarcely those of a man confident of victory.  Had Bat been there to witness, the task he was at that moment engaged upon would surely have been robbed of half its satisfaction.

But Bat had gone.  And with him had gone the man who was to learn the rigours of a Labrador winter under conditions of hardship he had not yet realised.  Meanwhile Standing was free to think as his emotions guided him, with no watchful eyes to observe.

“You’ll see me again, and when you do—­well, don’t forget Hellbeam’s at the other end of this business.”

The words haunted.  The threat of them appealed to an imagination that was a-riot.

After a time Standing stirred restlessly.  He sat up and brushed the litter of paper aside.  Then he leant back in his chair and his fine eyes were lit with an agony of doubt and disquiet.  The poisonous seed of the agent’s retort had fallen upon fruitful soil.

But after awhile the tension seemed to relax, and his gaze wandered from the grey daylight beyond the window and was suddenly caught and held by the mail bag, still lying where the man had flung it.  It was like the swift passing of a summer storm.  The man’s whole expression underwent a complete transformation.  The mail!  The mail from Quebec—­unopened!