ur gospel-shop just
now! Keep your palaver for those that need it. Let me pass, before I
have to teach you that you haven't to deal with a gang of hysterical old
women to-night."

"But not until you know that one of those women,--Vashti White,--by
God's grace converted of her sins, has confessed her secret and yours,
Elisha Barker! Yes! She has told me how her sister's husband--the father
of the young girl you are trying to lure away--helped you off that night
with your booty, took his miserable reward and lived and died in exile
with the rest of your wretched crew,--afraid to return to his home and
country--whilst you--shameless and impenitent--lived in slothful ease at
the Mission!"

"Liar! Let me pass!"

"Not until I know your purpose here to-night."

"Then take the consequences! Here, Pedro! Ramon! Seize him. Tie him head
and heels together, and toss him in the bush!"

The sound of scuffling recommenced. The struggle seemed fierce and long,
with no breath wasted in useless outcry. Then there was a bright flash,
a muffled report, and the stinging and fire of gunpowder at the window.

Transfixed with fear, Cissy cast a despairing glance around her. Ah,
the bell-rope! In another instant she had grasped it frantically in her
hands.

All the fear, indignation, horror, sympathy, and wild appeal for help
that had arisen helplessly in her throat and yet remained unuttered, now
seemed to thrill through her fingers and the tightened rope, and broke
into frantic voice in the clanging metal above her. The whole chapel,
the whole woodland, the clear, moonlit sky above was filled with its
alarming accents. It shrieked, implored, protested, summoned, and
threatened, in one ceaseless outcry, seeming to roll over and over--as,
indeed, it did--in leaps and bounds that shook the belfry. Never before,
even in the blows of the striking surges, had the bell of the Tamalpais
clamored like that! Once she heard above the turmoil the shaking of the
door against the bolt that still held firmly; once she thought she
heard Seabright's voice calling to her; once she thought she smelled
the strong smoke of burning grass. But she kept on, until the window was
suddenly darkened by a figure, and Brother Seabright, leaping in, caught
her in his arms as she was reeling fainting, but still clinging to the
rope. But his strong presence and some powerful magnetism in his touch
restored her.

"You have heard all!" he said.

"Yes."

"Then for