"
"Oh, if I could only save him, Lois! He was the first man I had ever
met whom I trusted, the first to trust me. I owe him everything, the
little that is good in me. It had to come to life when he believed in
it so implicitly. And he owes me ruin, outward and inward ruin."
Lois made no answer. With a warm, impulsive gesture she put her arms
about the taller woman's neck and, drawing the beautiful face down to
her own, kissed her. Beatrice responded, and thus a friendship was
sealed--not for life but for death, whose grim cordon was with every
moment being drawn closer about them.
The sound of firing had now grown incessant. One report followed
another at swift, irregular intervals, and each sounded like a clap of
thunder in the silent room. Mrs. Cary stirred uneasily in her sleep, a
low, scarcely audible groan escaped the parted lips, as though even in
her dreams she was being pursued by fear's pitiless phantom. Her
self-appointed nurse continued to fan her with the energy of despair,
the poor livid face twitching at every fresh threatening sound. Mrs.
Carmichael still pretended to be absorbed in her pinafore, but the
revolver lay on the table, ready to hand, and there was a look in the
steady eyes which boded ill for the first enemy who should confront
her. Lois and Beatrice continued their fruitless task.
A woman's courage is the supreme victory of mind over matter. It is no
easy thing for a hero to sit still and helpless while death rattles
his bullet fingers against the walls and screams in voices of hate and
fury from a distance which every minute diminishes.
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