“Nail the mutt!” sharply ordered the leader, a man with a heavy shock of red hair.
One of the men twisted Parsly’s arm behind him and thrust an iron wrist under his chin. Two others stood near, one holding a revolver, the other caressing a “life-preserver.” The leader was glancing about the office.
All this occurred in a single motion, yet it seemed to cover ages to the stupefied agent. It was the red-headed man’s prowling gaze that brought Parsly to his senses. They were yeggmen—Fresno Red and his gang. They were after the money and the leader was seeking the safe.
The man who had seized the agent was deciding he had never in all of his strong-arm jobs encountered so thoroughly frightened a victim as now, when Parsly’s chin hugged in and his strong teeth bit deeply into his captor’s wrist, causing him to scream with pain. At the same instant, the agent’s long leg kicked out, overturning the table and the one lamp.
The room was plunged in darkness and the man with the revolver discharged his weapon, evoking a shriek of mortal agony, but not from the agent. Fresno Red called loudly for a light while he attempted to strike a match. Parsly had the advantage; he knew one of the robbers was dead or seriously wounded, and while every man was his enemy in the darkness, the yeggmen feared to injure a pal.
“Block the door and window!” roared Fresno Red.
During this brief leeway Parsly’s groping hands found, the office stool and he swung it around his head in a deadly circle. By the sickening crunch he knew at least one of the enemy was off the active list. Then a match flared up for a second and the leader’s revolver exploded, the agent experiencing a stinging sensation in the side.
For an instant Parsly felt strangely numb; then the stool rose like a flail and the man with the “life-preserver” sank to the floor.
Somehow the agent now felt a riotous elation. Fear was a very distant emotion. His veins were filled with molten lead instead of blood. He breathed hate rather than the smoky air. It was a monstrous thing that these murderers should seek to rob his employers.
With a wild howl of rage he plunged into the remaining two men, lucking and smashing like a maniac with the fragment of the stool. Out through the door they poured, another of the gang falling with a fractured skull. Then Parsly discovered he was alone.