"Eh?"
"Is it too late for me to make good?"
"Talk!" exclaimed the Colonel, in bitter derision; "always talk with you. You don't mean that any more than you meant any of the lying promises you made to me in the past. You have always been a liar! A liar, a spendthrift, and a fool—and now, added to all these things, to your gambling and your profligacy, you've finished as a——"
He paused, and Manton ventured:
"In regard to a way out, sir?"
The Colonel looked at him with renewed ferocity, then his expression slowly changed. For some seconds he was silent, and, without a glance at Manton, he began to fumble at a drawer. He drew it open at length, and groped in its interior. His hand shook visibly, but there was something in his attitude, some strange intensity of purpose, that riveted Manton's attention. Presently the Colonel discovered the object he sought, and revealed from the depths of the drawer an automatic pistol.
"If you have a shred of honour left you will know what to do," he said grimly. He reached out, and laid the weapon on the corner of the desk at the young man's side.
CHAPTER IV
Then Colonel Treves rose slowly to his feet, took up his stick, and moved towards the door of the room. With his hand on the door knob, he pointed his stick at the weapon on the table. Manton had remained motionless; utterly at a loss. Now the old soldier's meaning gradually revealed itself.
"You want me to take this and——?"