He watched the man in the restaurant, who had risen and waved his hand,
evidently acknowledging a signal from some one. It was the man Pete
had seen near the express office--there was no doubt about that. Pete
noticed that he was broad of shoulder, stocky, and wore a heavy gold
watch-chain. He disappeared within the doorway below. Presently Pete
heard some one coming up the uncarpeted stairway--some one who walked
with the tread of a heavy person endeavoring to go silently. A brief
interval in which Pete could hear his own heart thumping, and some one
else ascended the stairway. The boards in the hallway creaked. Some
one rapped on the door.
"I guess this is the finish," said Pete to himself. Had he been
apprehended in the open, in a crowd on the street, he would not have
made a fight. He had told himself that. But to be run to earth this
way--trapped in a mean and squalid room, away from the sunlight and no
slightest chance to get away . . . He surmised that these men knew
that the men that they hunted would not hesitate to kill. Evidently
they did not know that Brevoort was gone.
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