"But—" Crill drew a sobbing breath, and the madness of terror suddenly flared into his eyes. "It's the money—Stark—I'd never get out of these woods alive without the money to pay. He'd leave me to die, or kill me."
"Of course," agreed Dexter, nodding his head.
Crill stared at him for a single, incredulous instant, and wilted like a punctured balloon. "Oh, no!" he faltered, choking. He groped his way back to the table and his hands reached out in fawning appeal. "Please, Corporal Dexter! You don't—you don't know Stark—"
His voice broke in an agonized whisper, but before he could go on with his pleading, another voice interrupted from the farther side of the room.
"My ears are burning. I must have heard my own name." The words cut sharp and incisive, like rifle shots, from the front of the cabin.
Dexter and Crill and Alison swung around as though they had been jerked by a string, and they remained like three statues, staring towards the open doorway.
Framed in the early morning twilight, suave and smiling, stood Owen Stark.
CHAPTER XXXV
HAZARD OF THE GAME
The newcomer had arrived without a sound. Evidently he had just forded his way across the rapids. Water trickled in rivulets from his legs and his clothing clung to his spare frame; but in spite of wetness he still retained his well-groomed, debonnaire appearance. He smiled appreciatively at the scene before him as he absently thumbed the hammer of the rifle he held gripped in his hands.