With a startled breath he whirled about, just in time to see Crill rise from his seat and fling himself across the table.
Dexter caught a glimpse of an evil, bloated face and two slits of eyes, glaring with ugly purpose. The table was overturned with a crash, and Crill lunged forward, reaching with his ponderous hands.
The corporal felt murderous fingers at his throat, but in the fraction of an instant vouchsafed him he twisted away, threw himself backwards and fell from his stool. He caught his weight on his left hand, and then, before his heavier assailant could drop upon him, he sprang to his feet, and a cat-like leap carried him back to the cabin wall.
Even as he dodged across the room, Dexter's hand had gone to his jacket pocket. If the man still came on, he must shoot him down. His fingers started to close upon the butt of his revolver, and found nothing to take hold of. A limp, helpless feeling came over him as he waited at bay, with his shoulders backed against the wall. His weapon was not in his pocket.
CHAPTER XXXIII
HIGH STAKES
At times before this the corporal had faced death without a tremor of fear. Now, as he looked into the malignant face, hideous and bestial, looming before him in the shadow of the fireplace, he felt loathing and disgust, but he was not afraid. Crill outweighed him by nearly a hundred pounds; he was crippled, unarmed, defenseless. Yet as he felt the logs behind him, and knew there was no further retreat, the beat of his pulse grew slow and regular and an icy calmness gripped him.
His hand was still in his pocket, and he kept it there. "Stop!" he said in a low, chilling voice.
The outlaw checked himself in mid-stride, and as though drawn by hypnotic force, his glance wavered and focussed itself upon the pocket of the corporal's jacket. He balanced on his feet for an instant with tensely drawn muscles, torn between the madness to kill and the craven dread of taking a chance.
"Back!" commanded Dexter, his hand gripped rigidly in his lifted pocket.