“Your damned dog first—then you!” gasped Minster.
The weakness struck Peter Zinn again. His great head lolled back on his shoulders. “God,” he moaned, “gimme strength! Don’t let Blondy die!”
And strength poured hot upon his body, a strength so great that he could reach his hand to the rifle on the floor, gather it to him, put his finder on the trigger, and raise the muzzle slowly, slowly as though it weighed a ton.
The knife had fallen again. It was a half crimson dog that still clung to the slayer. Feet beat, voices boomed like a waterfall in the next room. Then, as the knife rose again, Zinn pulled the trigger, blind to his target, and as the thick darkness brushed across his brain, saw something falling before him.
He seemed, after a time, to be walking down an avenue of utter blackness. Then a thin star ray of light glistened before him. It widened. A door of radiance opened through which he stepped and found himself—lying between cool sheets with the binding grip of bandages holding him in many places and wherever the bandages held, the deep, sickening ache of wounds. Dr. Burney leaned above him, squinting as though Peter Zinn were far away. Then Peter’s big hand caught him.
“Doc,” he said. “What’s happened? Gimme the worst of it.”
“If you lie quiet, my friend,” said the doctor, “and husband your strength, and fight for yourself as bravely as you fought for Constable Frejus, you’ll pull through well enough. You have to pull through, Zinn, because this town has a good deal to say that you ought to hear. Besides—”
“Hell, man,” said Peter Zinn, the savage, “I mean the dog. I mean Blondy—how—what I mean to say is—”
But then a great foreknowledge came upon Peter Zinn, His own life having been spared, fate had taken another in exchange, and Blondy would never lie warm upon his feet again. He closed his eyes and whispered huskily: “Say yes or no, Doc. Quick!”