“Stop him! Stop him! He’ll be killed!”
“I bet you he won’t,” a burly furnace tender smiled quietly. “He’s a hard boiled egg, that boy; muscles like steel and quick as a cat. If anybody does him in you’ll have to give him credit. Y’ought t’ see him box. There ain’t a man among us that can touch him.”
Somewhat reassured by this glowing description of her companion, the girl settled back again in her seat. She knew that she was safe enough here with these rough but kindly men.
As she sat there thinking, there came to her mind a question. Why did James go into such a fit of anger at sight of the stranger at the door?
“Surely,” she told herself, “it could not have been because the man had been following me. That wouldn’t be natural. James scarcely knows me. Why should he suddenly become such a violent champion of my cause? And besides, he had no way of knowing that that was the man who was following me. He did not wait to ask a single question; just whispered: ‘That’s him!’ and rushed right at him.”
“No he didn’t do it because of me,” she concluded after a few moments of thought. “He’s seen that man before. I wonder when and where. I wonder what he’s done to James?”
Then came another, more startling question. What would James do to the man if he caught him?
Instantly her keen imagination was at work. Quickening her sense of hearing, it set her listening to sounds which she told herself were the dull thud of fist-blows, the sickening rush of a blade as it sped through the air, a low groan of pain, and then sharper, more distinct, the pop-pop of an automatic.
In vain she told herself that with the hiss of steam, the dull thud-thud of revolving grates and the general noises of the boiler-room, it was quite impossible for her to distinguish sounds ten yards away, and that in all probability the two men were hundreds of feet away from her, on some other floor. The illusion still persisted. So certain did she become that a battle was being fought just outside the door that she found herself gripping the arms of her chair to keep from crying out.
The nickel-plated clock against the wall had ticked away a full half hour. The suspense had grown unbearable when of a sudden, with face grimy, hair tousled, and clothing all awry, James appeared at the door.