His mind functioned like lightning.  His legs and arms flashed for the counterhold that would save him.  They struck the Spot and rolled over and over.  Chick caught his hold, but the Senestro broke it almost instantly.  Yet it had saved him; for a minute they spun around like a pair of whirligigs.  Watson kept on the defensive.  He had not the speed and skill of the other.  It was no mere test to touch his shoulders; it was a fight to the death; he was at a disadvantage.  He worked desperately.

When a man fights for his life he becomes superhuman.  Watson was put to something more than his skill; the sheer spirit of the Bar broke hold after hold; he was like lightning, panther-like, subtle, vicious.  Time after time he spun Chick out of his defense and bore him down into a hold of death.  And each time Chick somehow wriggled out, and saved himself by a new hold.  The struggle became a blur—­muscle, legs, the lust for killing—­and hatred.  Twice Watson essayed the offensive; first he got a hammer lock, and then a half-Nelson.  The Bar broke both holds immediately.

Whatever Chick knew of wrestling, the Senestro knew just a bit more.  It was a whirling mass of legs and bodies in continuous convulsion, silent except for the terrible panting of the men, and the low, stifled exclamations of the onlookers.

And then—­

Watson grew weak.  He tried once more.  They spun to their feet.  But before he could act the Senestro had caught him in the same flying rush as in the beginning, and had whirled him off his feet.  And when he came down the Bar had an unbreakable hold.

Chick struggled in vain.  The Bar tightened his grip.  A spasm of pain shot through Chick’s torso; he could feel his bones giving way.  His strength was gone; he could see death.  Another moment would have been the end.

But something happened.  The Senestro miraculously let go his hold.  Chick felt something soft brush against his cheek.  He heard a queer snapping, and shouts of wonder, and a dreadful choking sound from the Bar.  He raised dizzily on one arm.  His eyes cleared a bit.

The great Bar was on his back; and at his throat was a snarling thing—­the creature that Chick had seen in the clover leaf of the Jarados.

It was a living dog.

PAT MACPHERSON’S STORY

To Watson it was all a blur.  He was too weak and too broken to remember distinctly.  He was conscious only of an uproar, of a torrent of multitudinous sound.  And then—­the deep, enveloping tone of a bell.

Some time, somewhere, Chick had heard that bell before.  In his present condition his memory refused to serve him.  He was covered with blood; he tried to rise, to crawl to this snarling animal that was throttling the Senestro.  But something seemed to snap within him, and all went black.

When he opened his eyes again all had changed.  He was lying on a couch with a number of people about.  It was a minute before he recognized the Jan Lucar, then the Geos, and lastly the nurse whom he had first seen when he awoke in the Blind Spot.  Evidently he was in the hands of his friends, although there was a new one, a red-headed man, clad in the blue uniform of a high Bar.