Save for his own interference, they would have been in the hands of his murderer.

The use of them for a few days could do no one any harm.
Such risk as there was he took himself.

That it was a risk he knew and fully realized.

Laverick had sat in his place unmoved when his partner had poured out his wail of fear and misery.

Yet of the two men it was probable that Laverick himself had felt their position the more keenly.