He waited with a slim hand stretched across the table, while Adolph plunged a hand into an inside pocket with a grin, felt in another concealed pocket, and returned to the first with his face growing grave and pale.
The Wolf watched him with steely eyes, suspicion dawning in them.
"Too slow; too slow, Adolph!" he smiled.
Adolph looked up. "It is not here! It is gone! Some one has stolen it!" he stammered.
The Wolf snarled. "Oh, no, good Adolph!" he said silkily. "Look again."
Adolph, with fingers that shook, turned his pockets out one by one, then looked into the Wolf's yellow eyes with a gaze pleading yet sullen. "They are gone," he said huskily.
With a flashing motion the Wolf reached across the table and clutched Adolph by the throat. In a steel grip that he struggled hopelessly to loosen he was helpless as a child. Brutally the Wolf bore him back to the wall, where he beat his head savagely against the door frame. A look of savage glee shone on the Wolf's smooth countenance.
Ledermann leaped across the floor and seized the Wolf's arm.
"Off!" cried the murderer, and with his hand dealt Ledermann a stinging blow in the face. He fell back. Behind the overturned table, the Weasel sat looking at the floor. It was nothing to him what they did. He shrugged his thin shoulders.
Suddenly the Wolf stopped and let Adolph slip to the floor, where he lay unconscious.