Two of the burglars--there were four or five of them, as Badger could see--were to wait outside, while their pals on the inside made their search for valuables.
Suddenly there came a cry for help from within the house, followed by the sounds of a struggle.

Fairfax Lee, unable to sleep and wandering as restlessly about within the house as the Westerner had upon the outside, had come unexpectedly upon the first burglar at the upper landing of the rear stairway.

The burglar looked so marvelously like the crazy office-hunter, Bill Gaston, that Lee believed him to be Gaston, and that Gaston had invaded the house for purposes of assassination.
Though Lee had dreaded a meeting with Gaston, and would have gone far out of his way to avoid anything of the kind, he was by no means a coward.

He expected a shot from Gaston's pistol, and to prevent this, he hurled himself on the burglar with a suddenness and boldness that took the latter by surprise.
The cry for help did not come from the lips of Fairfax Lee, but from those of the burglar.

Badger, however, fancied that the call had come from Lee.