He bored me with his beady rat eyes for several seconds.

"Friend of yours?" he asked, briefly.

Something in the intonations of his voice induced me to frankness.

"I have good cause to think he's trying to kill me," I replied.

He produced a pocketbook, fumbled in it for a moment, and laid before me
a clipping. It was from the Want column of a newspaper, and read as
follows:

A.A.B.--Will deal with you on your terms. H.H.

"A.A.B. that's me--Artie Brower. And H.H.--that's him--Henry Hooper," he
explained. "And that lil' piece of paper means that's he's caved, come
off, war's over. Means I'm rich, that I can have my own ponies if I want
to, 'stead of touting somebody else's old dogs. It means that I got old
H.H.--Henry Hooper--where the hair is short, and he's got to come my
way!"

His eyes were glittering restlessly, and the pupils seemed to be unduly
dilated. The whiskey and opium together--probably an unaccustomed
combination--were too much for his ill-balanced control. Every
indication of his face and his narrow eyes was for secrecy and craft;
yet for the moment he was opening up to me, a stranger, like an oyster.
Even my inexperience could see that much, and I eagerly took advantage
of my chance.