Their drawn faces bent close to hers.  She felt their hot hands as they drew her wrists in front of her and fastened them with a rope.  “Not too tight, Chan,” Ray advised.  “We don’t want her to get uncomfortable before we’re done with her.  Don’t tie her ankles; she can’t run through the brush with her arms tied.—­Now give her a moment to breathe.”

They stood on each side of her, regarding her with secret, growing excitement.  Already they had descended too far to know pity for this girl.  The wide-open eyes, so dark with terror and in contrast with the stark paleness of her face, the lips that trembled so piteously, the slender, girlish figure so helpless to their depraved desires moved them not at all.

The scene was one of never-to-be-forgotten vividness.  The tenderness and mercy, most of all the restraint that has become manifest in men in these centuries since they have left their forest lairs to live in permanent abodes, had no place here.  About them ringed the primeval forest, ensilvered by the moon; the fire crackled with a dread ferocity; and at the edge of the thickets the motionless form of Jeffery Neilson lay with face buried in the soft, summer grass.  All was silent and motionless, except the fierce crackling of the fire; except a curious, intermittent, upward twitching of the corner of Ray’s lips.

“So you and Ben are bunkies now, are you?” he asked slowly, without emphasis.

But the girl made no reply, only gazing at him with starting eyes.

“A traitor to us, and Ben’s squaw!” He turned fiercely to Chan.  “I guess that gives us right to do what we want to with her.  And now she can yell if she wants to for her lover to come and save her.”

She did not even try to buy their mercy by informing them where they might find Ben.  Only too well she knew that their dreadful intentions could not be turned aside:  she would only sacrifice Ben without aiding herself.  Ray moved toward her, his eyes deeply sunken, the pupils abnormally enlarged.

“You haven’t lost all your looks,” he told her breathlessly.  “That mouth is still pretty enough to kiss.  And I guess you won’t slap—­this time—­”

He drew her toward him, his dark face lowering toward hers.  She struggled, trying to wrench away from him.  Helpless and alone, the moment of final horror was at hand.  In this last instant her whole being leaped again to Ben,—­the man whose strength had been her fort throughout all their first weeks in the wilds, but whom she had left helpless and sick in the distant cavern.  Yet even now he would rise and come to her if he knew of her peril.  Her voice rose shrilly to a scream.  “Ben—­help me!”

And Ray’s hands fell from her shoulders as he heard the incredible answer from the shore of the lake.  The brush rustled and cracked:  there was a strange sound of a heavy footfall,—­slow, unsteady, but approaching them as certain as the speeding stars approach their mysterious destinations in the far reaches of the sky.  Ray straightened, staring; Chan stood as if frozen, his hands half-raised, his eyes wide open.