“So you’re goin’ to stick to this thing of bringin’ Benson and Joe to the gallows?” “That’s just what I’m going to do!” she told him. “You told Buffalo Bill to git one of my waiters out of the way and put a spy in here in his place.” She did not answer. “That’s so, ain’t it? Out with it!” “I see I’m a little fool.” “I think you are, myself.” “I mean, I’m a fool, or I would have lied to you, and made you think I would do whatever you told me to do; now, I’ll have to get out of that Casino company, and out of the wine rooms, and won’t be able to do any of the things I had planned.” “Still, you won’t come round to my idea, even when you know that?” “No! I can’t.” “You’ve got in you the making of a mighty good woman!” He sneered. “But let me tell you why you didn’t lie to me. It’s because you couldn’t. You know you couldn’t fooled me, if you had tried it. So,” he paused, and drew a deep breath, “I’m givin’ you now the last chance. Say the word, and you’ll not want for friends, or money, while you’re in this town. But if you still want to stand in with that law-and-order crowd--well!” He drew up his shoulders and threw out his hands. “If you do,” he ended, “that’s your lookout. I’ll----” “You’ll do what?” she said, rising, terrified by his answer. He rose, too. As it chanced, his chair was nearer the door than hers, so that now, apparently without having intended it, he blocked her way out. “I’ll do this!” he said, stepping toward her. She stared at him, frozen and stupefied with sudden horror, because of the alteration in his face and manner; it was as if a smiling man had changed into a snake before her very eyes. And though she tried to recoil, she did not seem able to do it. “I’ll do _this_!” he repeated, putting out his hand--a fat, pudgy hand, that now had a clammy look, as if the fingers were brown eels. She tried to step backward and cry out. But the hand shot out, and the next moment it had clutched her throat. She fell to the door, writhing in that deadly, serpent grip. CHAPTER XVII. THE BARON’S EXPERIENCE. “Idt pegins to loogk like excidemendt iss goming my vay in punches.” The round-bodied baron, hiding in the shadows, stared hard at a man of big girth who hurried past him bearing a burden in his arms that strongly resembled the limp form of a woman. The baron, having heard everything in that interview with Vera Bright, had begged to be assigned work in and about the Casino. “I haf done some goot sbying dhere alreadty,” he urged. “I know some uff der beoples, too.” “But you couldn’t disguise yerself, Schnitz. Every dog in Blossom Range knows ther look o’ ye, by this time,” old Nomad had told him.