“When I can't handle one man after I've got him covered I'll let you know, Johnson.”
The two men went out into the starlit night and got into the surrey. The play with the revolver had hitherto been for the benefit of Johnson, but it now became very real. Dunke jammed the rim close to the other's temple.
“I want that letter I wrote you. Quick, by Heaven! No fairy-tales, but the letter!”
“I swear, Joe—”
“The letter, you villain! I know you never let it go out of your possession. Give it up! Quick!”
Struve's hand stole to his breast, came out slowly to the edge of his coat, then leaped with a flash of something bright toward the other's throat. Simultaneously the revolver rang out. A curse, the sound of a falling body, and the frightened horses leaped forward. The wheels slipped over the edge of the narrow mountain road, and surrey, horses, and driver plunged a hundred feet down to the sharp, broken rocks below.
Johnson, hearing the shot, ran out and stumbled over a body lying in the road. By the bright moonlight he could see that it was that of his employer. The surrey was nowhere in sight, but he could easily make out where it had slipped over the precipice. He ran back into the shaft-house and began telephoning wildly to town.
CHAPTER XIII — STEVE OFFERS CONGRATULATIONS
When Fraser reached the dining-room for breakfast his immediate family had finished and departed. He had been up till four o'clock and his mother had let him sleep as long as he would. Now, at nine, he was up again and fresh as a daisy after a morning bath.