“Wait a minute,” he said. “You are an older man than I am, an' you are my daddy, but if you lay the weight of your hand on me I'll kill you as sure as you've got a live hair on your head.” “You mean to threaten me--you damned midnight prowler!” And Hoag, brandishing his rope, sprang at his son like a tiger on its prey. But Henry quickly and deftly caught the descending rope, jerked it from the fat fingers, and threw it against the wall. Then, while Hoag stood for an instant bewildered, Henry clutched him round his big, bare neck and began to push him backward over the bale of leather. From side to side the two swung, grunting, panting, swearing. A mist was before Hoag's eyes; ten prongs of steel were piercing and separating the bones and muscles of his neck. He was gasping for breath when, by an extra effort, he tore his son's hands away. For a second they stood warily shifting from side to side, and then they locked in the embrace of madmen, and the struggle for supremacy was renewed. Over the rough floor, here and there among boxes, bundles, and bales, they slid and pounded. Suddenly Henry became conscious that his father was trying to get his hand into his hip-pocket. “Oh, that's your game, eh?” he said, between his teeth. “Two can work at it.” And the younger suddenly slid his hand over the back of the older man and grasped the hilt of the revolver. Then he ducked downward suddenly and stood aside, the weapon in his hand. “Stand back!” he ordered, calmly, and Hoag, with eyes of despair on the revolver, fell away. Visions of death flashed and flared before him--visions of the monster Trawley was fearing. He held up his hands; their shadows on the wall quivered like the moving branches of a tree in a storm. “Don't, for God's sake, don't!” he pleaded. “I'm--I'm your father.” Henry stared for a moment, and then an expression of sheer horror crept over his face. Suddenly he threw the revolver against the wall and bowed his head to a cotton bale. “My God, oh, my God!” he cried, his hands pressed into the sockets of his eyes, his breast heaving. Slowly Hoag lowered his uplifted hands. Silence ensued--silence broken only by the audible panting of the two men. Presently Hoag spoke. “You started to kill me,” he gasped. “Why didn't you do it? You had the chance.” “Oh, my God--oh, my God!” Henry exclaimed, in muffled tones. “Yes, yes, I came near it. I didn't know what I was about. You got me in a corner. You started at me. You made me mad. But I am not a murderer--bad as I am, I am not that. I saw you trying to pull the gun and forgot what I was doing.” “Huh, you say you did?” Hoag seemed unable to formulate anything else. “You say you did?” Suddenly stepping aside, Henry picked up the rope his father had held a moment before. Hoag stared helplessly as he came toward him with it extended in his hands. “Take it!” Henry gulped. “What for?” Hoag asked, wonderingly.