otel when he glimpsed two figures crouching against the fence of the
alley. He stopped in his tracks, watched them intently an instant, and
was startled by a whistle from the rear. He knew at once his retreat,
too, was cut off, and without hesitation vaulted the fence in front of
a big gray stone house he was passing. A revolver flashed from the
alley, and he laughed with a strange kind of delight. His thought was
to escape round the house, but trellis work barred the way, and he
could not open the gate.

"Trapped, by Jove," he told himself coolly as a bullet struck the
trellis close to his head.

He turned back, ran up the steps of the porch and found momentary
safety in the darkness of its heavy vines. But this he knew could not
last. Running figures were converging toward him at a focal point. He
could hear oaths and cries. Some one was throwing aimless shots from a
revolver at the porch.

He heard a window go up in the second story and a woman's frightened
voice ask. "What is it? Who is there?"

"Let me in. I'm ambushed by thugs," he called back.

"There he is--in the doorway," a voice cried out of the night, and it
was followed by a spatter of bullets about him.

He fired at a man leaping the fence. The fellow tumbled back with a
kind of scream.

"God! I'm hit."

He could hear steps coming down the stairway and fingers fumbling at
the key of the door. His attackers were gathering for a rush, and he
wondered whether the rescue was to be too late. They came together, the
opening door and the forward pour of huddled figures. He stepped back
into the hall.

There was a raucous curse, a shot, and Yesler had slammed the door
shut. He was alone in the darkness with his rescuer.

"We must get out of here. They're firing through the door," he said,
and "Yes" came faintly back to him from across the hall.

"Do you know where the switch is?" he asked, wondering whether she was
going to be such an idiot as to faint at this inopportune moment.

His answer came in a flood of light, and showed him a young woman
crouched on the hall-rack a dozen feet from the switch. She was very
white, and there was a little stain of crimson on the white lace of her
sleeve.

A voice from the landing above demanded quickly, "Who are you, sir?"
and after he had looked up', cried in surprise, "Mr. Yesler."

"Miss Balfour," he replied. "I'll explain later. I'm afraid the lady
has been hit by a bullet."

He was already beside his