This accomplished, his small eyes darted around swiftly. The table, a closed roll-top desk with a battered swivel-chair, and a heap of old pasteboard boxes and circulars in a corner of the tiny room represented the only furnishings. Apparently there was no safe.
He tiptoed to the window and pulled the wrinkled green shade to the bottom. He tried the top of the desk, and it rolled up obediently. Within was a small metal box, locked with a hasp and a small padlock.
He gasped with relief. His first impulse was to grab the strong-box and run. With an effort he resisted the temptation. He must make sure that the money was there.
He wiped his moist palms on his overalls, and vainly tried to control the tremors that shook him. He took out the heavy cutters, with the idea of using them as a lever in an attempt to break the box. He was just starting to insert them below the hasp when padding footsteps came to his ears.
An exclamation that was like a sob burst from his ashen lips as he turned, his fingers gripped around the instrument in his hands. Dim against the blackness of the open door, because of the lamp between, he saw the scraggly white hair and peering eyes of Bilney. A trembling revolver flashed close to the door-jamb.
Blindly, unthinkingly, Buchanan leaped forward and swung. He was in an ecstasy of terror. The report of the wild shot echoed like thunder an instant before his weapon sank in the skull of the trembling old man. He dropped, limply horrible. The revolver crashed to the floor.
“Daddy!”
Swiftly flying footsteps up the passage came to his ears like the approach of some avenging fate. He met the girl as she burst through the doorway. His hand closed over her mouth. Her anguished eyes blazed into his.
He met the girl as she burst through the doorway, her anguished eyes blazed into his and for a moment she seemed petrified with terror.