He had been near to failure. He had held himself in check until now; but now at last his tautened nerves threatened to give way. Falcon was waiting and watching for this, was expecting it. It was the look of expectancy in the man's eyes, the cool confident look of triumph and of faint scorn which stabbed and stung Lachlan like a knife or a whip.
A sudden hot anger blazed in him because this man had expected him to falter, anger which was all the hotter because he knew that for an instant he had faltered. He was afraid, but he knew now that fear would not master him, and with this knowledge a savage, reckless happiness surged in him.
He leaned across the table and struck Falcon across the mouth with the back of his hand.
"You call yourself a soldier," he said hoarsely. "If you have a soldier's pride, you will wipe out that stain before your seamen throw me to the sharks."
Falcon did not move. There was a fleck of blood upon his mouth, but the lips were smiling. At last he brought his open hand down upon the table with a crash.
"Well done, Lachlan McDonald!" he cried. "Well done, and well spoken, and a happy, happy thought—a flash of inspiration, no less! A thrust through the heart or lungs in fair fight is not murder, and it is a more gentlemanly way of killing a man than dropping him overboard."
He rose and, still smiling broadly, bowed; then
