Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 27, No. 2, September 24, 1927

Pink nodded. He looked haggard and drawn and ill. He stared hard at Smith — not seeing the man sitting before him, but seeing a high bluff on the Karoo in the pitiless blaze of the African sun — seeing himself standing near the edge of that bluff, hearing the first slight sound which told him of Smith’s presence behind him — feeling once more the twinge of terror which leaped through his heart as he turned — too late — and hearing his own wild cry as he went hurtling out and down to the stones far below.

“You’re deep,” he said. “By God, you are! Deep at killin’ and twistin’. It’s easy for a snake to find it’s way into a man’s bed; easy for a man to slip over the crumblin’ edge of a bluff; and hard for anybody to say as anybody’s put the snake in its place or pushed the bloke that fell. You’re a good killer, Smith — but when you started in on killin’ me, you started wrong.”

“Apparently, I did,” said Smith. “As I believe you observed earlier in this conversation, I miscalculated the requisite height. But the past is past. We were discussing the present. About this eavesdropping business. What of it?”

“This.” Pink leaned forward. “I want half of all you scoop on this stock deal.”

“And if you don’t get it?”

“I’ll kill you.”

“When?” asked Smith. He might even have been amused, by the light in his eyes.

“What d’you mean?” snapped Pink. “See here, Smith. I’ve not searched the face of the earth for you for years to be chivvied. You get that tight. If I hadn’t overheard what I did the last time I was here, and to-night, you’d have been dead by now.”

“Really? Let me explain. I can’t give you half of the proceeds of the deal now — because the deal has not come off yet. If you leave me alone to clear the deal — you might find difficulty in killing me. It’s now or never. Pink, it seems to me.”

It was the most courageous thing William Smith had ever done in his life. It was the biggest bluff he had ever put up. It had its effect.

Pink momentarily, but visibly, faltered. He said harshly: “What’ve you got up your sleeve, Smith?”

“I? Why?”

“Cheeking me like this.”

Smith laughed. “Nothing, Pink. How can I?”

Pink stared at him uncertainly. Bill Smith, thought Pink, knew how dangerous he — Pink — was. Their past association must have taught him that. He had robbed and tried to murder Pink. He knew that Pink had sought him across the wide earth to take his life. And yet he was undisturbed. He indicated to Pink the vital necessity for immediate and drastic action.

It was not logical. Smith was no man to take mad chances. He knew something which was hidden from Pink. Suddenly, Pink wondered if he sat in a position of deadly peril! The thought set his flesh creeping, for, like most physically weak folk, he had an inordinate love of his own life.

He was remembering all Smith’s cunning in the years that were gone; how Smith had never been cornered, had never tasted the bitterness of defeat and failure. The terror of the man’s name in those old days was revived in Pink’s memory. Smith had been the unnamed leader of the Fellowship, despite their vows of equality, and that period of his captaincy had left its mark on the innermost mind of the twisted, broken little devil now facing him.

Pink leaned forward. Suffering had distorted both his mind and body. The broken wreck a Boer had found at the bottom of the bluff and had patched up into some semblance of manhood was not the balanced deadly creature who had crossed hands and sworn the oath that night the Fellowship of Strangers was formed. William Smith was realizing that. Pink was dangerous — but not too dangerous. Thus reasoned Smith.

Pink snapped: “I asked you what you’ve got up your sleeve.” His eyes blazed. His wasted form was racked by a violent emotion which swept through him like the breath of a typhoon. “I say this, Smith — I’ll hang for you. I mean it. If I get you — they can do what they like with me. Now, am I in on this deal or not?”

“I fail to see how you can be,” said Smith. He had a consciousness of increasing peril. Bluff would hardly succeed with the desperate man opposite him. He wondered what he could do to thwart Pink. “You see, Pink, I shouldn’t play straight with you any more than you’d play straight with me. The deal’s not through yet, as I’ve said, and once you let up on me — you’ve lost me.”

Again Pink was uncertain. It was the most amazing thing to which he had ever listened. He had expected lies, cajolery, wide promises; instead, he received the blunt truth. When one deals habitually in lies the truth is apt to deceive.

Smith was now tense and strained, although he managed to preserve an appearance of indifference. There was death for him in the mounting decision in Pink’s eyes. Pink intended to kill. Something shook inside Smith. For the first time in his life the cold fingers of fear lightly touched his heart.

Death — when the biggest coup of his career was reaching its consummation! Death — from this man he thought dead.