“You seem to have got a little of everybody's money,” suggested Sergeant Marden pointedly. “Anyway, I haven't seen any sign of them putting up a fight for you.”
“Quite so!” There was a sudden cold self-possession in Three-Ace Artie's tones. “Well, I can put up quite a fight for myself, thank you. I'm not going! It's too bad Shaw didn't have the nerve to come here and tell me this. I——”
“I wouldn't let him,” interposed the sergeant, with a curious smile. “That's why I came myself.”
Three-Ace Artie studied the other's face for an instant.
“Well, go on!” he jerked out. “What's the answer to that?”
“That I am going on to Dawson in the morning, and that I thought perhaps you might be willing to come along.”
Three-Ace Artie's under jaw crept out the fraction of an inch, and his eyes narrowed.
“I thought you said you weren't here officially!”
“I'm not—at least, not yet.”
“Well, it sounds mighty like an arrest to me!” snarled Three-Ace Artie. He stood up abruptly, and once more leaned over the table. His dark eyes flashed. “But that doesn't go either—not in the Yukon! You can't hold me for anything I've done, and you ought to know better than to think you can do any bluffing with me and get away with it! Murdock Shaw is. evidently running this little game. I gave him a chance to call my hand this afternoon—and he lay down like a whipped pup! That chance is still open to him—but he can't do it by proxy! That's exactly where you and I stand, Marden—don't try the arrest game!”