“So you figured I quit you, eh?  And you go and set in that winda so they’d think we was in the room here?  And you done it to give me a chanct?  Well, you got me wrong.  I stick.”

“Then I reckon somebody’s goin’ to git hurt,” said Pete, “for I’m goin’ to stick too.”

Brevoort shook his head.  “The first guy most like come over to ask the boss who’s up here in this room.  The boss tells him about us.  Now, them coyotes sure would like it a heap better to git us out on the street—­from behind—­than to run up against us holed up here, for they figure somebody’ll git hurt.  Now you slip down that hall, easy, and drop onto the shed under the winda and fan it down the alley back there.  You got a chanct.  I sized up the layout.”

“Nothin’ doin’.  Why don’t you try it yourself?”

“’Cause they’ll git one of us, anyhow, and it’ll be the fella that stays.”

“Then I’ll flip a dollar to see which stays,” said Pete.

Before Brevoort could speak, Pete drew a dollar from his pocket and flipped it toward his companion.  It fell between them.  “I say heads,” said Pete.  And he glanced at the coin, which showed tails.  “The dollar says you go, Ed. You want to git a-movin’!”

Brevoort hesitated; Pete rose and urged him toward the door.  “So-long, Ed. If you’d ‘a’ stayed we’d both got shot up.  I’ll set in the winda so they’ll think we ’re both here.”

“I’ll try her,” said Brevoort.  “But I’d ‘a’ stayed—­only I knowed you wouldn’t go.  So-long, pardner.”  He pulled his gun and softly unlocked the door.  There was no one in the hall—­and no one on the narrow stairway to the right.  He tiptoed to the window, climbed out, and let himself down to the shed-roof.  From the roof he dropped to the alley, glanced round, and then ran.

Pete locked the door and went back to his chair in front of the window.  He watched the man in the restaurant, who had risen and waved his hand, evidently acknowledging a signal from some one.  It was the man Pete had seen near the express office—­there was no doubt about that.  Pete noticed that he was broad of shoulder, stocky, and wore a heavy gold watch-chain.  He disappeared within the doorway below.  Presently Pete heard some one coming up the uncarpeted stairway—­some one who walked with the tread of a heavy person endeavoring to go silently.  A brief interval in which Pete could hear his own heart thumping, and some one else ascended the stairway.  The boards in the hallway creaked.  Some one rapped on the door.

“I guess this is the finish,” said Pete to himself.  Had he been apprehended in the open, in a crowd on the street, he would not have made a fight.  He had told himself that.  But to be run to earth this way—­trapped in a mean and squalid room, away from the sunlight and no slightest chance to get away . . .  He surmised that these men knew that the men that they hunted would not hesitate to kill.  Evidently they did not know that Brevoort was gone.  How could he hold them that Brevoort might have more time?  He hesitated.  Should he speak, or keep silent?