"Hands up!" commanded a sharp, high-pitched voice.
The corporal stood stock-still, gazing in blank amazement at the face that peered at him from behind the rifle sights. And all at once he recognized the unexpected intruder, and he caught his breath in wonderment. The man was Alison's brother, Archie.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE FALTERING FAITH
It was disconcerting to meet an armed and hostile man at the place where he supposed his friend was waiting, yet Dexter did not for an instant lose his self-possession. He noticed that the rifle barrel did not hold quite steady, and he was aware that the inexperienced youth might fire in nervous excitement at any second, without giving him a chance. Before he could make up his mind what to do, however, a voice screamed out behind him, and Alison stumbled forward, apparently with some wild notion of intervening.
"Archie!" the girl cried in an agonized tone.
The corporal flung out his arm as a barrier, and thrust her back. He was watching young Preston's face, observing the line of the tensely compressed lips, staring into the blue eyes that squinted at him along the gun barrel. And it struck him all at once that the boy lacked the hardihood to pull the trigger.
They faced each other in silence for a moment, and Dexter smiled in icy contempt, "I can't obey your order about the hands," he said, "because I have only one to put up. So I won't bother at all."
With a slow, deliberate movement he unbuttoned his tunic and thrust his hand into his inside pocket. Quite casually, as though he might have reached only for a handkerchief or a match, he drew forth the small, pearl-handled revolver that he had picked up months before from the floor of the murder cabin. He knew that any instant might be his last, but he was banking on the irresolution he had read in the other's face, and was ready to accept a gambler's hazard. Gazing with cool fixity into the boy's eyes, he cocked his weapon and leveled the barrel.
"Drop that gun!" he commanded.