CHAPTER XVII
HEAVEN AND HELL
HE waited an eternity; in actual time it was exactly ten minutes. Then a cavalcade tramped down the hall. He heard their voices, and Hal Dozier was among them. About him flowed a babble of questions as the men struggled for the honor of a word from the great man. Perhaps he was coming to his room to form the posse and issue general instructions for the chase.
The door opened. Dozier entered, jerked his head squarely to one side, and found himself gazing into the muzzle of a revolver. The astonishment and the swift hardening of his face had begun and ended in a fraction of a second.
"It's you, eh?" he said, still holding the door.
"Right," said Andrew. 'Tm here for a little chat about this Lanning you're after."
Hal Dozier paused another heartbreaking second, then he saw that caution was the better way. "I'll have to shut you out for a minute or two, boys. Go down to the bar and have a few on me." He turned, laughing and waving to them, and Andrew's heart went out to such consummate coolness, such remarkable nerve. Then the door closed, and Dozier turned slowly to face his hunted man. Their glances met, held, and probed each other deeply, and each of them recognized the man in the other. Into Andrew's mind came back the words of the great outlaw, Allister: "There's one man I'd think twice about meeting, and that"
