The red-haired man was fighting. He had always been fighting. The square jaw, the bull neck proclaimed him of the battling breed; even before one had scope to note the alert, light eyes, the tight mouth, the short, broad hands with their stubby strength of finger. In prize ring, in mediaeval battlefield, in ’longshore tavern, Caleb Conover would have slugged his way to supremacy. In business he won as readily--and by like methods. His was not only the force but also the supreme craft of the fighter. Therefore he was president, instead of bouncer, in the offices of the C. G. & X. Railroad. It was not railroad business that engrossed Conover as he sat at his desk one day in early spring: tearing open a ceaseless series of telegrams, scribbling replies, ringing now and then for a messenger to whom he gave a curt order. Telegrams and messages ceased. In the lull, Conover jumped to his feet and began to walk back and forth. His big hands were clenched, his head thrust forward, his whole muscle-bound body tense. Then began a violent ringing from the long-distance telephone in the far corner of the room. Conover picked up the receiver, grunted a question, then listened. For nearly five minutes he stood thus, the receiver at his ear, his broad, freckled face impassive save for a growing fire in the pale, alert eyes. A grunt of dismissal and the receiver was hung on its hook. Conover crossed the room, threw himself into a big creaking chair, cocked his feet on the window sill, drew out and lighted a fat cigar. The tenseness was gone. His whole heavy body was relaxed. He smoked mechanically and let his gaze rove with dull inertness over the blank wall across the street. He was resting as hard as he had fought. A clerk timidly opened the door leading from the outer offices. “Mr. Caine, sir,” ventured the employee, “He says he--” “Send him in,” vouchsafed Conover without turning his head. His eyes were still fixed in unseeing comfort on the wall, when his guest entered. Nor did he shift his glance without visible reluctance. The newcomer seemingly was used to his host’s lack of cordiality. For, favoring Conover with a slight nod, he deposited his hat, gloves and stick on the table and lighted a cigarette, before speaking. Conover surveyed the well-groomed figure of his visitor with an air of disparaging appraisal that reached its climax as he noted the cigarette. “Here!” he suggested, “Throw away that paper link between fire and a fool, and smoke real tobacco. Try one of these cigars if you want to. They’ll fit your mouth a lot better. Why does a grown man smoke a--?” “This grown man,” replied Caine, unruffled, “has a way of doing what he chooses. I came to see if you were ready to go to your execution.” “Execution, eh?” grinned Conover. “Well, it’s just on the books that there _may_ be a little executin’ done, up there. But _I_ won’t be the gent with his head on the block. Besides, you’re an hour early.”