Page:Melville Davisson Post--The Man of Last Resort.djvu/60

36 fool, but I did not think about the boy getting hurt, not once.” The man shut his teeth tight together and the big muscles swelled out on his jaws.

The Auditor sat and watched the man across the table from him, and admired his iron nerve in the terrible struggle to decide between himself and the welfare of his friend. The man was evidently suffering. His face showed it plainly; the battle must be a bitter one. The Auditor wondered how it would result. He pitied the man, and in spite of all, half hoped that he would decide to save himself.

Presently the gambler turned slowly and lifted his face, white, haggard, ten years older than he had been an hour before.

“I don't see how to keep him from doing it,” he muttered; “I don't see how.”

The Auditor started. This man had not been thinking of himself at all.

“You see,” continued Hergan. “I am about fifty thousand short, and there is no way to raise that much money,—no way in God's world. If I slide over the Rio, Al will pay it to keep them from extraditing me; and if I