SAFE CUSTODY
hall so they can't get into the house. If I was there
to lead them I'd	soon have them in, but they're
not used to shooting and they're staying out of the
wet."
" Let them enter by the window/' said the priest.
" And who's to show 'em ? " flashed Harris. " Who's
going to cross that hall and get a hole in his guts ? "
''Mount this stair/' said the other, "and the
passage above it will take you the length of the house.
So you can go and return without	"
" I'm tiot your	lackey, and I didn't come here
to-night to play hide-and-seek."
" My friend/' said the priest—I could see his
uplifted hands—" be calm. A house divided against
itself falleth. When my servants arrive to assist
" You 	sinner," spat Harris, " don't prate to
me. For forty years you've been squatting outside
this fort, and now I've opened the door and handed
you in. And now, by God, it's your turn. Spill
your brains here and now, or I drop my end of the
cord. I've got the girl, and she's good enough for
me. But don't think you're in on that deal.
If I quit to-night without the goods, I leave you here."
Now all the time they had been speaking I had been
trying as well to listen as to decide what to do. Had
it been day I would have gone down and shot Harris
at point-blank range, but now the torch had been
extinguished, and I was afraid of failing to kill my
man. And if I tried, but failed, he would most surely
kill me, and then Olivia was lost, for I alone knew
that she was captive and where she was.
Thanks to our work that day, I knew the style of the
chamber in which she was now confined. If my great-
234