. . .And, strangling and panic-struck, he became wilder in his fruitless efforts to wrench loose. Then, deprived of breath and with his nerve-centers shaken, he lost the power to strive.

It was the time for which Gavin had waited. With perfect ease, now, he twisted the knife from the failing grasp, and, with his left hand, he reinforced the throat-grip of his right. As he did so, he got his legs under him and arose, dragging upward with him the all but senseless body of his garroted foe.

It had been a pretty bit of work, from the start, and one upon which his monkey-faced Japanese jui-jutsu instructor would have lavished a grunt of approval.

He had conquered an armed and muscular enemy by his knowledge of anatomy and by applying the simple grip he had learned. And now, the heaving half-dead murderer was at his mercy.

Gavin swung the feebly twitching body out, more fully into the strea. . . Read More