Page:Arthur Stringer - Gun Runner.djvu/256

 for his light-switch and snapped on the current. The blank darkness puffed into a sudden picture.

It showed in sparkling high-lights on the wireless apparatus. It revealed the huddled figure of Ganley crouching back against the sleeping-berth. It showed the white-faced and terrified woman close by the cabin door. But that was all; for in the next second the light went out again, and the cabin was once more blanketed in utter darkness.

But McKinnon, in that brief heart-throb of illumination, had caught and fixed in his mind's eye the position of his fallen revolver.

He was already on his hands and knees, on the floor, like a cat, crawling to the farther corner of his dynamo base.

The silence seemed something material, something smothering and choking the three watchers. No one knew from what quarter the bolt would strike. McKinnon's fingers padded feverishly yet silently about the floor, exploring the area in which his fallen revolver must lie. He thought he had it; but his fingers had closed only on his heavy, canvas-covered dumb-bell. He padded farther into the blackness, feeling along the dynamo base, wondering if it were blood or only sweat that was trickling down his face.