those whom I now believed would soon become my murderers.

'"I can go no further," said I; "what have you brought me here for?
What do you want me to do?" Again the same voice which I had first
heard at the office, though I could not identify the speaker from the
shouting and confusion around me, cried aloud, "We want a reduction of
our rents, will you promise to get us that?"

'There are times of instant danger, when it is said that the whole of
a man's past life rushes before him in the spaces of a single moment.
If ever there be such a time, this was such to me. I stood there,
exhausted, without one friendly face on which to rest, and surrounded
by _the worst of ten thousand men who seemed determined to have a
victim_. I knew and felt all this. So I said very quietly, as a last
effort to save my life, and hoping they would name something I could
promise to ask,

'"And what reduction will you be content with?"

'Again the same voice replied,

'"We will never pay more than one-half our present rents."

'"Then," said I, "there ends the matter, _I never will promise that_."

'There was a pause, and a dead silence. I stood _naked and bareheaded
before them_. They stood opposite to me, with their sticks clenched in
their hands, ready to strike. I looked at them, and they at me. They
hesitated; _no one would strike me first_. I saw that they wavered,
and instinctively, in a moment I _felt_ that I had won. This sudden