It was no longer the deep, controlled voice of the stoic; it was the almost whining complaint of vital weakness.
"Is there anything I can do for you?" parried Byrne. "Anything you need or wish?"
"Him!" answered the old man explosively. "Damn it, I need Dan! Where is he? He was here. I felt him here while I was sleepin'. where is he?"
"He has stepped out for an instant," answered Byrne smoothly. "He will be back shortly."
"He—has—stepped—out?" echoed the old man slowly. Then he rose to the full of his gaunt height. His white hair, his triangle of beard and pointed moustache gave him a detached, a mediaeval significance; a portrait by Van Dyck had stepped from its frame.
"Doc, you're lyin' to me! Where has he gone?"
A sudden, almost hysterical burst of emotion swept Doctor Byrne.
"Gone to heaven or hell!" he cried with startling violence. "Gone to follow the wind and the wild geese—God knows where!"
Like a period to his sentence, a gun barked outside, there was a howl of demoniac pain and rage, and then a scream that would tingle in the ear of Doctor Randall Byrne till his dying day.