Merton gave a short laugh that had in it a touch of sadness. “A good curtain it was, too,” he continued, quietly. “I remember I made a frantic endeavour to overtake him as he raced up to the house, and then, because I just couldn’t help myself, I stopped and watched—fascinated. The window of the big living-room was open, and the light blazed out. I suppose they had never anticipated pursuit that night. Leaning up against the wall was the girl, with a look of frozen horror on her face, while seated at the table were Pedro Salvas and three of his pals. And they were drinking. “It all happened very quickly. For one second I saw Jimmy Mainwaring framed in the window—then he began shooting. I don’t think I’ve mentioned that he could shoot the pip out of the ace of diamonds nine times out of ten at twenty yards, and his madness did not interfere with his aim. And that night he was stark, staring mad. I heard three shots—so close together that only an artist could have fired them out of the same revolver and taken aim; I saw the three friends of Pedro Salvas collapse limply in their chairs. And then there was a pause; I think Jimmy wanted to get at _him_ with his hands. “But it was not to be. Just for a moment the owner of the bungalow had been so stupefied at the sudden appearance of the man he hated that he had simply sat still, staring; but only for a moment. The movement of his arm was so quick that I hardly saw it; I only noticed what seemed to be a streak of light which shot across the room. And then I heard Jimmy’s revolver again—the tenth, the hundredth of a second too late. He’d drilled Pedro Salvas through the heart all right—I watched the swine crumple and fall with the snarl still on his face—but this time the knife wasn’t sticking in the wall. “She got to him first,” went on Merton, thoughtfully. “His knees were sagging just as I got to the window, and she was trying to hold him up in her arms. And then between us we laid him down, and I saw that the end was very near. There was nothing I could do; the knife was clean into his chest. The finish of the journey had come to the man who could not get drunk. And so I left them together, while I mounted guard by the window with a gun in each hand. It wasn’t a house to take risks in. “He lived, I think, for five minutes, and of those five minutes I would rather not speak. There are things which a man may tell, and things which he may not. Sufficient be it to say that he may have cheated at cards or he may not—she loved him. If, indeed, he had committed the unforgivable sin amongst gentlemen all the world over, he atoned for it. And she loved him. Let us leave it at that.