"_Bed?_ What are you talking about?" demanded the other. "You have got to catch that four o'clock train for the dirigible."
"We have an alarm clock. We can get a little snooze. That is why I want to get this job done."
"That is why Smith told you to wait 'til three," said John. "Come, take your drink and have a smoke, and then it will soon be time to put our guest on his homeward way." He laughed evilly and lifted his glass. O'Brien noted with delight that his was the largest share. Drops of perspiration stood like beads on O'Brien's forehead as he lay there bound and gagged, waiting to see if the powder in the whiskey was going to work. What if it should taste and rouse suspicion in the breasts of the three villains? But the three drank down their several potions without a blink. They did not follow it with water, but let the fiery liquid run down their leathern throats as though it was milk.
Then filling their pipes, they settled back in their chairs to await the hour set for O'Brien's death. For fifteen minutes they talked and laughed and quarrelled about the exact time of administering the poison. But John stood firm. Smith had said three o'clock, and not one moment earlier would he hear to. He yawned as he spoke, and yawns from the others answered him. Suddenly he looked up with a queer look of surprise on his face.
John tipped forward in his chair. The others, still staring, slid backward and at once, it seemed, three heavy bodies swayed in their seats and slid to the floor. For a few moments the air seemed full of the sound of breathing rough and irregular; then slowly the breathing grew slower, deeper and more regular. It sounded like three great animals breathing together. They lay almost as they had fallen.
Painfully O'Brien raised himself to his elbow. He sat up. He could do no more as his feet were bound together. After a moment's thought, he lay back across the cot and commenced to slide toward the front edge. When his body was well off the edge he stiffened his neck and, carefully sliding along, went to the floor without a thump. Sitting there, he wondered what he would do next. If there was one thing he wanted, it was to avoid making a noise that might alarm the people who were cheerfully quarreling in the flat below. Not yet was his own head out of the noose, and he wanted to get help so that he could have the three unconscious men arrested. But there he was, still bound and, worse still, gagged! At any moment Smith might return to see that his orders were being carried out. O'Brien knew Smith too well to hope that he would leave anything as important as his, O'Brien's, execution to an underling. Haste was of the greatest importance. O'Brien knew that his life would not be worth a penny if Smith should drop in on the group now assembled on the floor.