"A few days, in which Arden may put you behind bars." Morini leaned against the door and began to pour flake tobacco into a curled slip of paper. "You underrate that man, Chief. He's cool--so cool he nearly gives me cold feet. And tough--he's just a slab of Bessemer on two legs." He fixed his cigarette with one deft twist and lighted it in the same movement. "I've met him before, and it was too even a chance between us to make me feel comfortable!" "Are you scared?" demanded Surcon malignantly. "Because, if so----" "_Scared_," said Morini equably, "is a word folks who know old Gat just don't use when I'm around. But I don't mind 'em knowing that a coffin isn't my idea of a good time." Surcon regarded his subordinate in silence, his big hands locked together on the table, his heavy brows lowered. "Well?" "Let me go gunning for him, Chief," begged Morini. "I tell you, I won't feel comfortable in this game till Arden's riding in a black buggy. He'd be easy--he takes any risk. He got Lew, but Lew always was too nervy to be much good at close work. I shouldn't have missed him that night." Surcon shook his head--reluctantly, one might have thought, but none the less definitely. His fingers untwined, and he flattened his palms slowly on the mahogany in a simple gesture that conveyed better than words the utter finality of his decision. "No. I'll deal with him. He needn't be killed. We can hold him until the Government have paid up, and then he can go." "You seem to have a soft spot in your heart for that guy." Morini flicked up an interrogative eyebrow. "Is he your long-lost brother or something?" Surcon ignored the question. "How's Rodriguez?" "Nearly dead. He'll go out to-night for a certainty. Trouble is, we can't have a doc. in with that place looking like a cross between an arsenal and a barracks." "I'll give instructions about him by telephone." Surcon rose and buttoned his coat. He picked up his hat, and Morini stood aside to give him passage. Surcon paused in the doorway, and his eyes fixed the gunman with a cold warning in them that was more acidly menacing than his words. "You understand?" he said. "Leave Arden to me. If you kill him, you will die. That's all." Morini showed his teeth. "_Is_ he your brother, Chief?" he taunted, and then the flame of concentrated venom that licked out of the big man's eyes made him shrink back. In that moment, with that one level gaze, Surcon, unarmed in the presence of a professional killer, showed who was master. "No--he is my son," he said simply, and was gone.