mouth, since Mad Ruth had her own pallet on the floor at the
narrowest part of the cave where it was like the neck of a monster
bottle, and always at the first sound of the girl's approach, was on
her feet to thrust her back. Clearly there was no way out of this
place of shadows except that through which she had come.

Judith sought an explanation of her imprisonment, and after long
groping she came very near the truth: Trevors would work his will with
Hampton through Hampton's faith in him and admiration for him. And, in
her absence, Hampton was the head of Blue Lake ranch.

Sunday night, hearing Mad Ruth moving cautiously, Judith raised herself
on her elbow, listening. She was confident that the woman was moving
toward the cave's mouth; she hoped wildly that Mad Ruth was tricked
into believing her asleep and was going out. Her shoes in her hands,
her stockinged feet falling lightly, Judith moved toward the mad
woman's couch.

Ruth was going out; was in fact even now slipping out of the narrow
throat of the cave and to the ledge. But Judith could not see her.
For a new, unexpected obstacle was in her way. Her outthrust hands
touched not rock walls but heavy wooden panels; she knew then that the
narrow neck of the cave was fitted with a heavy door and that it had
been drawn shut, fastened from without. In a sudden access of fury and
despair she beat at it with her two hands, crying out bitterly.

It was so dark, so inky black, and as still, save for her own outcry,
as a tomb sealed and forgotten. Such darkness, smothering hope,
suddenly was filled with vague terrors; for one worn-out and nervous as
Judith was, the darkness seemed to harbor a thousand ugly things which
watched her and mocked at her despair and reached out vile hands toward
her. She called loudly, and for answer had the crazed laugh of Mad
Ruth which floated in to her from without, but which seemed to drop
down from the void above.

"Judith, Judith," the girl whispered after the first outburst, when she
found that she was shaking pitifully. "You've got to do better than
this; I'm ashamed of you."

She went back to her couch, where she sat down seeking to hold her
jangling nerves in check. But, despite her intention, she sat shaking,
listening, listening--praying for even the footfall of her jailer.

When Ruth was with her she attempted in a hundred ways to gauge the
woman's warped brain, to seek some way to get the better of her, to
g