in size and strength,
would not have been a match for him now. Every animal passion in him
was roused to its worst.

Lang's jaws shot apart, his eyes protruded, his tongue came out--the
breath rattled in his throat. Then for a moment Philip's death-grip
relaxed. He bent down until his lips were close to the death-filled
face of his victim.

"The truth, Lang, or I'll kill you!" he whispered hoarsely.

And then he asked the question--and as he asked Josephine freed her
hands. She tore the cloth from her mouth, but before she could rush
forward, through Lang's mottling lips had come the choking words:

"It was Miriam's."

Again Philip's fingers sank in their death-grip in Lang's throat.
Twenty seconds more and he would have fulfilled his pact with Jean. A
scream from Josephine turned his eyes for an instant from his victim.
Out of that same cover of balsam three men were rushing upon him. A
glance told him they were not of the forest people. He had time to gain
his feet before they were upon him.

It was a fight for life now, and his one hope lay in the fact that his
assailants, escaping from the Nest, did not want to betray themselves
by using firearms. The first man at him he struck a terrific blow that
sent him reeling. A second caught his arm before he could recover
himself--and then it was the hopeless struggle of one against three.

Josephine stood free. She had seen Philip drop his pistol and she
sprang to the spot where it had fallen. It was buried under the snow.
The four men were on the ground now, Philip under. She heard a gasping
sound--and then, far away, something else: a sound that thrilled her,
that sent her voice back through the forest in cry after cry.

What she heard was the wailing cry of the dog pack, her pack, following
over the trail which her abductors had made in their flight from Adare
House! A few steps away she saw a heavy stick in the snow. Fiercely she
tore it loose, ran back to the men, and began striking blindly at those
who were choking the life from Philip.

Lang had risen to his knees, clutching his throat, and now staggered
toward her. She struck at him, and he caught the club. The dogs heard
her cries now. Half a mile back in the forest they were coming in a
gray, fierce horde. Only Josephine knew, as she struggled with Lang.
Under his assailants, Philip's strength was leaving him. Iron fingers
gripped at his throat. A flood of fire seemed bursting his head.
Josephine's cri