Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/308

 breast pocket; he saw also the shimmer of the nickel-plated weapon as it flashed into sight.

At once, without hesitation, he shot him through the head.

"Let that warn ye!" he cried. "The man who pursues me will get the selfsame dose!"

And he was gone, with one backward jump that took him through the doorway and clear of the portière. He faced around, dashing on to the spot where an oblong of grayish-black told him there should be a second door; he found it, gained through and collided with a man who had been running as hastily toward the banquet hall as O'Rourke was endeavoring to get away from it.

That man was the Nubian. He recoiled from O'Rourke; and the Irishman's eye, which seemed to have something of the faculty of a cat's in the dark in time of danger, caught the gleam of steel as the Nubian drew a dagger.

The inevitable followed. It seemed imperative. He pistoled the fellow ruthlessly.

The delay, infinitesimal as was the part of a second it had occupied, was more than serious. The dining hall was in chaos; the shrill, infuriated howls of the conspirators filled the building with an indescribably terrifying clamor.

O'Royrke glanced over his shoulder. The doorway was blocked with a struggling mass of men, fighting to be the first to get through and after him. He chuckled.

"Faith, so long as they keep that up," he said, "I'm atisfied!"

And he dashed on. The conspirators disentangled themselves and took up the chase. At first well bunched, it was no trouble at all for the Irishman to locate them, and to double away.

But, as he blundered headlong through empty suite after