John Bruce's eyes, from Crang's sallow face, and from Crang's revolver, swept coolly over his surroundings. A mattress, a foul thing, lay on the ground in one corner. There was no flooring here in the cellar. A small incandescent bulb hung from the roof. There was one chair and a battered table—nothing else; not even a window.
“It was like stealing from a child!” sneered Crang suddenly. “You poor mark!”
“Quite so!” said John Bruce calmly. “And the more so since I was warned that you were quite capable of—murder. I suppose that is what I am here for.”
“Oh, you were warned, were you?” Crang took an abrupt step forward, his lips working. An angry purple clouded the pallor of his face. “More of that love stuff, eh? Well, by God, here's the end of it! I'll teach you with your damned sanctimonious airs to fool around the girl I'm going to marry! You snivelling hypocrite, you didn't tell her who you were, did you?”
John Bruce stared blankly.
“Who I am?” he repeated. “What do you mean?”
Crang for the moment was silent. He seemed to be waging a battle with himself to control his passion.
“I'm too clever a man to lose my temper, now I've got you!” he rasped finally. “That's about the size of your mentality! The sweet, naïve, innocent rôle! Yes, I said a snivelling hypocrite! You don't eat dope, but perhaps you've heard of a man named Larmon—Mr. Gilbert Larmon, of San Francisco!”
To John Bruce it seemed as though Crang's words in their effect were something like one of those blows the same man had dealt him on his wounded side in that fight of the other night. They seemed to jar him, and rob his mind of quick thinking and virility—and yet he was quite sure that not a muscle of his face had moved.
“You needn't answer,” Crang grinned mockingly. “If you haven't met him, you'll have the opportunity of doing so in a few hours. Mr. Larmon will arrive in New York to-night in response to the telegram you sent him.”