The
years seemed to fall from him. He stepped nearer Rosenblatt and
stood in the full light and in the attitude of a soldier at
attention.

"Behold," he cried, "Michael Kalmar!"

"Ah-h-h-h!" Rosenblatt's voice was prolonged into a wail of despair
as from a damned soul.

"My father!" cried Kalman from across the ravine. "My father!
Don't commit this crime! For my sake, for Christ's dear sake!"

He rushed across the ravine and up the other slope. His father ran
to meet him and grappled with him. Upon the slope they struggled,
Kalman fighting fiercely to free himself from those encircling
arms, while like a fiery serpent the flame crept slowly toward
the cabin.

With a heavy iron poker which he found in the cabin, Rosenblatt had
battered off the sash and the frame of the window, enlarging the
hole till he could get his head and one arm free; but there he stuck
fast, watching the creeping flames, shrieking prayers, entreaties,
curses, while down upon the slope swayed the two men in deadly
struggle.

"Let me go! Let me go, my father!" entreated Kalman, tearing at his
father's arms. "How can I strike you!"

"Never, boy. Rather would I die!" cried the old man, his arms
wreathed about his son's neck.

At length, with his hand raised high above his head, Kalman cried,
"Now God pardon me this!" and striking his father a heavy blow, he
flung him off and leaped free. Before he could take a single step,
another figure, that of a woman, glided from the trees, and with a
cry as of a wild cat, threw herself upon him. At the same instant
there was a dull, thick roar; they were hurled stunned to the
ground, and in the silence that followed, through the trees came
hurtling a rain of broken rock and splintered timbers.

Slowly recovering from the shock, the Sergeant staggered down the
ravine, crying, "Come on!" to the others who followed him one by
one as they recovered their senses. On the other side of the slope
lay Kalman and the woman. It was Paulina. At a little distance was
Malkarski, or Kalmar, as he must be called, and where the cabin had
been a great hole, and at some distance from it a charred and
blackened shape of a man writhing in agony, the clothes still
burning upon him.

Brown rushed down to the Creek, and with a hatful of water
extinguished the burning clothes.

"Water! water!" gasped the wretch faintly.

"Bring him some water, some one," said Brown, who was now giving
his attention to Kalman. But no on