The newcomer was a short, thick-set man with a broad, red face. He wore a check suit of a particularly glaring pattern, and on the back of his head was stuck a bowler hat, the narrow brim of which seemed to emphasize the breadth of his face. A casual observer might have placed him for a coarse, good-natured man of rude but boisterous humor. The ethnological student would have known him at once for what he was--a cruel man-beast without capacity for pity. He started back as the lights went on, blinking a little, but his hand held an automatic pistol that covered the occupants of the room. “Put up your hands,” he growled. “Put ’em up!” Neither man obeyed him. Jimmy was amused and looked it, stroking his short beard with his white tapering fingers. The old man was fury incarnate. He it was that turned to Jimmy and croaked-- “What did I tell ye, Jimmy? What’ve I always said, Jimmy? Massey is a pig--he’s got the manners of a pig. Faugh!” “Put up your hands!” hissed the man with the pistol. “Put ’em up, or I’ll put you both out!” “If he’d come first, Jimmy!” Old Reale wrung his hands in his regret. “S’pose he’d jumped the rug--any sneak-thief could have done that--d’ye think he’d have spotted the man in armor? If you’d only get the man in armor ready again.” “Put your pistol down, Massey,” said Jimmy coolly, “unless you want something to play with. Old man Reale’s too ill for the gymnastics you suggest, and I’m not inclined to oblige you.” The man blustered. “By God, if you try any of your monkey tricks with me, either of you----” “Oh, I’m only a visitor like yourself,” said Jimmy, with a wave of his hand; “and as to monkey tricks, why, I could have shot you before you entered the room.” Massey frowned, and stood twiddling his pistol. “You will find a safety catch on the left side of the barrel,” continued Jimmy, pointing to the pistol; “snick it up--you can always push it down again with your thumb if you really mean business. You are not my idea of a burglar. You breathe too noisily, and you are built too clumsily; why, I heard you open the front door!” The quiet contempt in the tone brought a deeper red into the man’s face. “Oh, you are a clever ’un, we know!” he began, and the old man, who had recovered his self-command, motioned him to a chair. “Sit down, Mister Massey,” he snapped; “sit down, my fine fellow, an’ tell us all the news. Jimmy an’ me was just speakin’ about you, me an’ Jimmy was. We was saying what a fine gentleman you was”--his voice grew shrill--“what a swine, what an overfed, lumbering fool of a pig you was, Mister Massey!” He sank back into the depths of his chair exhausted.