Max raised his pistol … and from the bunk almost at his elbow leapt
Miguel the quadroon, a sand-bag raised. It descended upon the
Frenchman's skull … and he crumbled up limply and collapsed upon
the floor. There came a crash of broken glass from the shop.
Uttering a piercing cry, the old woman staggered from the door near which she had been standing as if stricken helpless, during the lightning moments in which these things had happened—and advanced in the direction of Ah-Fang-Fu.
"Ah, God! You kill him! You kill him?" she moaned.
"Through the window, Sowerby! This way!" came Dunbar's voice. "Max!
Max!"
The sustained note of a whistle, a confusion of voices and a sound of heavy steps proclaimed the entrance of the police into the shop and the summoning of reinforcements.
Ah-Fang-Fu rose. Stuart had ceased to struggle. The Chinaman replaced his hat and looked up at the woman, whose eyes glared madly into his own.
"Tche', tche'e," he said sibilantly—"Tchon-dzee-ti Fan-Fu.*"
* "Yes, yes. It is the will of the Master."
"Down with the door!" roared Dunbar.
The woman threw herself, with a wild sob, upon the motionless body of
Stuart.