who have been fighting against us? Charity begins at home, I think."

"You get your own salary, don't you?" I asked.

"Oh, I'm not starving," Aiken said, with a grin. "There's a lot of
loot in being chief-of-police. This is going to be a wide-open town if
I can run it."

"Well, you can't," I laughed. "Not as long as I'm its provost
marshal."

"Yes, and how long will that be?" Aiken retorted. "You take my advice
and make money now, while you've got the club to get it with you. Why,
if I had your job I could scare ten thousand sols out of these
merchants before sunrise. Instead of which you walk around nights to
see their front doors are locked. Let them do the walking. We've won,
and let's enjoy the spoil. Eat, live, and be merry, my boy, for to-
morrow you die."

"I hope not," I exclaimed, and I ran down the steps of the palace and
turned toward the barracks.

"To-morrow you die," I repeated, but I could not arouse a single
emotion. Portents and premonitions may frighten some people, but the
only superstition I hold to is to believe in the luck of Royal
Macklin.

"What if Fiske can hit a scarf-pin at twenty paces!" I said to myself,
"he can't hit me." I was just as sure of it as I was of the fact that
when I met him I was going to fire in the air. I cannot tell why. I