Staggering backward, and easing his bleeding relative to the ground, he turned with a mad cry and dashed at the throat of Professor Darlington Ruggles.
Both men staggered across the floor against the stairs.
"I will strangle you for this," hissed the enraged detective.
"Help!" gasped Ruggles.
Brower came to his assistance with a vengeance, and rained terrific blows upon the head of Dyke Darrel with the butt of his revolver. Soon the mad grip relaxed from the throat of Ruggles, and Dyke Darrel sank a bleeding and insensible mass to the floor.
Panting and gasping, Professor Ruggles leaned against the stairs and gazed about him in the gloom.
The lamp had been overturned in the struggle, and at the last, darkness reigned supreme.
"I've fixed him, Professor," growled Nick Brower, in a savage undertone.
"I hope so, the devil. He went for me with the venom of a tiger. Have you a match?"
"Yes."