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“Thirteen minutes.”

Unconsciously, Arnold was counting aloud. The flame was very low, now, and he started to move his chair closer, then sank back, a smile, almost ghastly, upon his lips. The blaze had reached the level of the socket, and was growing smaller and smaller. Two minutes yet to burn! He had lost.

He tried to turn his eyes away, but they seemed fastened to the spot, and he powerless. It was as though death, from staring him in the face, had suddenly gripped him hard. The panorama of his past life flashed through his mind. The thoughts of the drowning man, of the miner who hears the rumble of crumbling earth, of the prisoner helpless and hopeless who feels the first touch of flame,–common thought of all these were his; and in a space of time which, though seeming to him endless, was in reality but seconds.

Then came the duller reaction and the events of the last few minutes repeated themselves, impersonally, spectacularly,–as though they were the actions of another man; one for whom he felt very sorry. He even went into the future and saw this same man lying down with a tiny bottle in his hand, preparing for the sleep from which there would be no awakening,–the sleep which, in anticipation, seemed so pleasant.

Concomitant with this thought the visionary shaded into the real, and there came the determination to act at once, this very afternoon, as soon as Ichabod had gone. He even felt a little relief at the decision. After all, it was so much simpler than if he had won, for then–then–He laughed gratingly at the thought. Cursed if he would have known what to have done, then!

The sound roused him and he looked at his watch. A minute had passed, fourteen from the first and the flame still sputtered. Was it possible after all–after he had decided–that he was not to lose, that the decision was unnecessary? There was not in his mind the slightest feeling of personal elation at the prospect, but rather a sense of injury that such a scurvy trick should be foisted off upon him. It was like going to a funeral and being confronted, suddenly, with the grinning head of the supposed dead projecting through the coffin lid. It was unseemly!

Only a minute more: a half now–yes, he would win. For the first time he felt that his forehead was wet, and he mopped his face with his handkerchief jerkily; then sank back in the chair, instinctively shooting forward his cuffs in motion habitual.

“Fifteen seconds.” There could be no question now of the result; and the outside world, banished for the once, returned. The blacksmith was hammering again, the strokes two seconds apart, and the fancy seized the little man to finish counting by the ring of the anvil.

“Twelve, ten, eight,” he counted slowly. “Six” was forming on the tip of the tongue when of a sudden the tiny flame veered far over toward the holder, sputtered and went out. For the first time in those interminable minutes, Arnold looked at his companion. Ichabod’s face was within a foot of the table, and in line with the direction the flame had veered. Swift as thought the small man was on his feet, white anger in his face.

“You blew that candle!” he challenged.

Ichabod’s head dropped into his hands. An awful horror of himself fell crushingly upon him; an abhorrence of the selfishness that could have forgotten–what he forgot; and for so long,–almost irrevocably long. Mingled with this feeling was a sudden thanksgiving for the boon of which he was unworthy; the memory at the eleventh hour, in time to do as he had done before his word was passed. Arnold strode across the room, his breath coming fast, his eyes flashing fire. He shook the tall man by the shoulder roughly.

“You blew that flame, I say!”

Ichabod looked up at the furious, dark face almost in surprise.