Sixty seconds more--forty--thirty! He could see the fiery end of the fuse almost at his feet.

Suddenly his groping fingers came in contact with the cold steel of his pocket revolver and with a last hope he snatched it forth, stretching down his pistol arm until the muzzle of the weapon was within a dozen inches of the deadly spark.

At his first shot the spark leaped, but did not go out.

After the second there was no longer the fiery, creeping thing on the floor, and, crushing his head back against the sacks, Howland sat for many minutes as if death had in reality come to him in the moment of his deliverance.

After a time, with tedious slowness, he worked a hand into his trousers' pocket, where he carried a pen-knife.