There was a chance--with the odds
heavily against him--but it was the only way.
They were on the landing outside now; and now, old Jake shouting
excitedly amongst them, a dozen forms swept through the doorway, and
scuffing, stamping, yelling, made for the inner room--and Jimmie Dale
slipped out into the hall. His lips pressed tightly together. That had
been as he had expected, but the danger still lay before him--in the
three flights of stairs. Some one was coming up now, more than one,
the stragglers--but there would be stragglers until the last occupant
of the tenement was aroused. He dared not wait. In a minute more, in
less than a minute, they would have lighted the gas again in there and
found him gone.
He jumped for the head of the stairs--a dark form loomed up before him.
Jimmie Dale launched himself full at the other. There was a cry of
surprise, an oath, the man pitched sideways, and Jimmie Dale sprang by.
A yell went up from the man behind him; it was echoed by a wild chorus
from above, as of wolves robbed of their prey; it was re-echoed by
shouts from the stairways and halls below--and with his left hand on the
banisters to guide him, taking the stairs four and five at a time,
Jimmie Dale went down--and now, aiming at the ground, his revolver spat
and barked a vicious warning, cutting lurid flashes through the murk
ahead of him.
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