Your case is closed." He turned to his one-time friend.
"What have you got to say for yourself, Jimmie Carlisle?"
Old Jimmie believed that his last hour was come. He showed something
of the defiant, almost maniacal courage of a coward who realizes he
can retreat no farther.
"What I got to say, Joe Ellison," he snarled in a sudden rage which
bared his yellow teeth, "is that I'm even with you at last!"
"Even with me? What for?"
"For the way you double-crossed me in nineteen-one in that Gordon
business. You never gave me a dime--said the thing had fallen down--
yet I know there was a big haul!"
"I told you the truth. That Gordon thing was a fizzle."
"There's where you're lying! It was a clean-up! And I knew you'd been
cheating me out of my share in other deals!"
"You're absolutely wrong, Jimmie Carlisle. But if you thought that,
why didn't you have it out with me at the time?"
"Because I knew you would lie! You were a better talker than I was,
and since our outfit always sided with you, I knew I wouldn't have a
chance then. But I reasoned that if I kept quiet and kept on being
your friend, I'd get my chance to get even if I waited awhile. I
waited--and I certainly got my chance!"
"Go on, Jimmie Carlisle!"
And Old Jimmie went on--a startlingly different Old Jimmie, his pent-
up evil now loosed into quivering, malignant triumph; went on with the
feverish exultation of a twisted, perverted mind that has brooded long
over an imagined injustice, that has brooded greedily and long in
private over his revenge, and at last has his chance to gloat in the
open.
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