it and convert it into cash. "I ain't so much stuck on monkeyin'
with them religious things," he had said. And she was certain that if
Calumet knew of her danger he would not have had her hesitate an
instant in relinquishing the diagram to Taggart.

The idol had brought him nothing but evil, anyway, and she was certain
that Calumet would not mourn its loss, even if Taggart were to be the
gainer by it, if its possession were to entail punishment, death,
perhaps, to her.

"Wait!" she cried as Taggart gave her arms an extra vicious twitch;
"you may have it!"

He released her with a greedy, satisfied grin and stood crouching and
alert while she turned her back to him and fumbled in her bodice, where
she had kept the diagram since the discovery of its former hiding place
by Telza.

She turned presently and gave him the paper, and he seized it eagerly
and examined it, gloating over it.

"That's it," he said; "that's the clearing!"

She was holding her arms, where he had squeezed them, her face flushed
with rage at the indignity he had offered her. She stood rigid,
defiant.

"If that is all you came for, you may go," she said; "go instantly!"

He jammed the paper into his pocket and grinned at her.

"It ain't all," he said. "I owe you somethin' for the way you've
treated me. I'm goin' to pay it. You've been too much of a lady to
talk to me, but you'll live here with that--"

He reached suddenly out and seized her hands again, attempting to throw
an arm around her. She evaded the arm and wrenched herself free,
slipping past him and darting to the other side of the table. He stood
opposite her, his hands on the table as he leaned toward her, grinning
at her, brutally and bestially, and pausing so as to prolong his
enjoyment of her predicament.

"I'll get you, damn you!" he said; "I've got the time and you can't get
out." He seized the kerosene lamp on the table and walking backward,
placed it on a shelf at the side of the wall near the stove. Then with
a chuckle of satisfaction and mockery he again went to the table
seizing its edge in his hands and shoving it against her so that she
was forced to retreat from its advance.

She divined instantly that he intended to force her against one of the
walls and thus corner her, and she opposed her strength to his, pushing
with all her power against the table in an effort to retard its advance.

It was to no purpose, for he was a strong man and his passions were