handle. And the next instant she was
running.

He caught her at the foot of the slope; she saw blood on his cheek and
puffy welts striping his distorted features, strove to strike him again,
but felt her arm powerless in his grasp.

"Are you mad!" she gasped.

"Mad about _you_! For God's sake listen to me, Valerie! Batter me, tear
me to pieces--and I won't care, if you'll listen to me a moment--"

She struggled silently, fiercely, to use her whip, to wrench herself
free.

"I tell you I love you!" he said; "I'd go through hell for you. You've
got to listen--you've got to _know_--"

"You coward!" she sobbed.

"I don't care what you say to me if you'll listen a moment--"

"As Rita Tevis listened to you!" she said, white to the lips--"you
murderer of souls!" And, as his grasp relaxed for a second, she tore her
arm free, sprang forward and slashed him across the mouth with the lash.

Behind her she heard his sharp cry of pain, heard him staggering about
in the underbrush. Terror winged her feet and she fairly flew along the
open ridge and down through the dead leaves across a soft, green, marshy
hollow, hearing him somewhere in the woods behind her, coming on at a
heavy run.

For a long time she ran; and suddenly collapsed, falling in a huddled
desperate heap, her slender hands catching at her throat.

At the foot of the hill she saw him striding hither and thither,
examining the soft forest soil or halting to listen--then as though
scourged into action, running aimlessly toward where she lay, casting
about on every side like a burly dog at fault.

Once, when he stood not very far away, and she had hidden her face in
her arms, trembling like a doomed thing--she heard him call to
her--heard the cry burst from him as though in agony:

"Valerie, don't be afraid! I was crazy to touch you;--I'll let you cut
me to pieces if you'll only answer me."

And again he shouted, in a voice made thin by fright: "For God's sake,
Valerie, think of _me_ for a moment. Don't run off like that and let
people know what's happened to you!"

Then, in a moment, his heavy, hurried tread resounded; and he must have
run very near to where she crouched, because she could hear him
whimpering in his fear; but he ran on past where she lay, calling to her
at intervals, until his frightened voice sounded at a distance and she
could scarcely hear the rustle of the dead leaves under his hurrying
tread.

Even then terror held her chained, br