The door was pushed open, and Birdie came in. He carried pen and ink, a large sheet of paper, and an envelope.
Crang motioned toward the table.
“Put them down there—and get out!” he ordered curtly; and then as the man obeyed, he stared for an instant in malicious silence at John Bruce. “I guess we're wasting time!” he snapped. “I sent the telegram to Larmon a few days ago, and I know all about you and Larmon, and his ring of gambling houses. You talked your fool head off when you were delirious—understand? And——”
John Bruce, his face suddenly white, took a step forward—and stopped, and shrugged his shoulders. Crang's outflung revolver was on a level with his eyes. And then John Bruce turned his back deliberately, and walked to the far end of the little room.
Crang laughed wickedly.
“I am afraid I committed a breach of medical étiquette,” he said. “I sent to San Francisco and got the dope on the quiet about this Mr. Larmon. I found out that he is an enormously wealthy man; and I also found out that he poses as an immaculate pillar of society. It looks pretty good, doesn't it, Bruce—for me? Two birds with one stone; you for trying to get between me and Claire; and Larmon coughing up the dough to save your hide and save himself from being exposed for what he is!”
John Bruce made no answer. They were not so fanciful now, not so unreal and wandering, those dreams when he had been ill, those dreams in which there had been a man with a quill toothpick, and another with a sinister, loathsome face, whose head was always cocked in a listening attitude.
“Well, I guess you've got it now, all of it, haven't you?” Crang snarled. “It's lucky for you Larmon's got the coin, or I'd pass you out for what you did the other night. As it is you're getting out of it light. There's paper on the table. You write him a letter that will get him down here with a blank check in his pocket. I'll help you to word it.” Crang smiled unpleasantly. “He will be quite comfortable here while the check is going through the bank; for it would be most unfortunate, you know, if he had a chance to stop payment on it. And I might say that I am not worrying at all about any reprisals through the tracing of the check afterward, for if Mr. Larmon is paying me to keep my mouth shut there is no fear of his opening his own.”
John Bruce turned slowly around.
“And if I don't?” he asked quietly.