flashes. As I swept across the valley a high elation perched beside me in the saddle.
Then, as I neared the rise, I loosened my carbine and reined in the horse until he seemed to walk on tiptoe.
THE HOUSE now was plainly visible; a solid stone building facing the climbing road.
The rooms behind the portico were in darkness, but from a side window on the lower floor still shone the single square of light that we had seen from the mountain. A veranda running back and partly around the house from the front afforded an open road to the window and whatever lay behind its illumination.
I walked my horse forward in shadow until I was almost beneath the veranda and in the shelter of a great tree. Then I dismounted and climbed the railing to the porch. A moment later I had cautiously adventured my head around a corner of the window frame.
Robert Hamelin sat before a wide table on which were scattered books and papers in a noble profusion. He was writing rapidly and in silence save for the scratching of his pen, which came to me faintly through the glass curtain. A calm, studious face, intelligent but weak, beneath a tangle of gray-black hair.
His hand was firm as it traveled swiftly over the paper; no adumbration of doom had occurred to shake those fingers or haunt the room with fear. He wrote without pause and with exquisite ease, and I wondered what task kept him until this hour in his study.
Apparently he had no visitor, but an influence, of whose working I had been unconscious, now drew my eyes away, and I saw—her.
I shall not attempt to describe her, save to say that no report of her beauty that I had heard had been adequate And her dark perfection was rendered the more incredible that it was found in this prison of books and legal papers.
Yet she lived and breathed in these surroundings as triumphantly young as when she had left her own civilization to dwell in this bleak district of blood and hate; and if her face were any mirror, her mind and heart were alight with thoughts that never had been mine. Tall she must be, I assumed, and lithe and powerful for a woman; but her face as she sat beside—. Well, I have said I would not attempt description,
Her eyes, at least, were for the man who bent in complete absorption above his papers. In them I read a devotion beyond limit, a depth of love that asked nothing in return; and in that understanding I experienced a happiness and a bitterness that wrung my heart. For I knew now that I had loved her always, and that she would never be mine.
As I watched, she rose and turned as if to leave the room. Despairingly, I leaned forward to follow her movement, and my impetuosity betrayed my presence. Her quick glance sought the window, and my face pressed against it turned her own white. A low cry must have left her lips, for Hamelin's glance followed hers, and in an instant he was on his feet, trembling. Then, with a bound, she had sprung for the window.
What her intention was I can not say. I did not stop to see, but sprang over the low rail and into the saddle. In another moment I was in full gallop across the valley, for the shock had cleared my wits and I knew that we were discovered.
I doubted if the respite would save Hamelin, but my duty was clear. I must report the situation at once. When I looked back over my shoulder the light in the window had disappeared. The house was in blackness.
I had no difficulty in finding my comrades, who were slowly advancing to meet me and who spurred their horses forward at my headlong coming. I turned beside Flood, in a shower of flying earth, and as we thundered down the road I jerked out my story in brief summary. He made no reply until we had all but reached the house; then he checked his horse and with a gesture commanded attention.
"Stormont and Sardis will come with me," he said evenly. "The rest of you will surround the house at the proper intervals and shoot down anybody attempting to leave."
Without further thought of concealment, we spurred our animals toward the front gate of the stone dwelling, and in a few moments confronted the blackness of the house.
I repeated my tale to the captain and omitted nothing; I knew that no word of mine could save Hamelin, even if I had wished to save him. But when I had finished, I said: "Captain, you must save her!"
He looked at me queerly. in the darkness; a flash of lightning illumined his hard face and gleamed on his rifle barrel.
"Must?" he asked, and laughed a curious laugh.
Sardis sneered openly.
"You understand my use of the word," I replied. "It is a plea. . . . She loves him!"
He made no reply. In the heavy gloom I could now read nothing in his features. And suddenly I wondered if she would care to be saved.
"At least," I said, "she should be spared the sight of his death."
Flood laughed a low, amused laugh, and slowly nodded his head.
"All right, Stormont," he said. "Stay here, both of you." He rode in through the gate and turned. "There is to be nothing between you and Sardis," he added casually.
"If Sardis opens his lips I shall kill him!" I snapped, my hatred overmastering my caution.
Flood rode slowly back to our side.
"If either of you lifts a finger, I shall kill you both!" he said with deadly evenness.
Then, as we dismounted, he cantered lightly up to the house and, urging his horse up the steps onto the veranda, knocked with the butt of his whip on the door panels.
I shuddered, thinking how that terrible knocking would sound upon the hearts of a man and woman within.
Sardis was painfully silent. In the west the low thunder still mocked and muttered, but otherwise the stillness was profound. The great house rose before us at twice its normal height, and at the doorstep, sinister in the saddle, sat Flood—knocking—
The disturbing influence of the earlier hours again had fallen upon me; a weight lay heavily on my consciousness.
With infinite relief, I heard from within the walls the high voice of Robert Hamelin, made higher by its pitch of terror. It was asking the meaning of the midnight visit, but its agony was the answer to the question. For Robert Hamelin knew the object and meaning of our errand; I had seen it in his face when he saw my eyes looking in at him through the window.
Flood's voice replied in crisp authority:
"The Riders do not explain. What they command is that Robert Hamelin. shall come forth. If he does not obey, his house will be entered and burned. If he comes forth like a man, his house and family shall be unmolested."
"To what does he go forth?" asked a clear, ringing voice that struck through me like an ecstasy of steel.
"To death!" replied Flood dispassionately. His voice might have been that of a presiding judge upon the bench.
"He will appear," cried the fearless accents beyond the door; and then we heard again the quavering tones of Robert Hamelin: “A moment—just a moment with my wife! I shall not keep you long."
Flood turned in the saddle and peered down into the darkness, then, wheeling
