“Take me back!  Oh, my God!”

“Cut out that hysterical stuff!” he ordered.  “I’m desperate!  I’ve got to have money.  I can raise it on a note if you’ll sign it and put up those bonds for security, and by—­”

He caught her wrist in a grip that made her wince with pain as he swung her around to face him.

“I’ve got to have your signature and the bonds!” he exclaimed in voice tense with suppressed passion.

“The bonds!” she exclaimed.  “You know what almost became of them.  I let you raise money on them once, and almost lost them.  Now you dare ask me for them again?”

“I do, and I’m going to enforce my demands!  I’ve got to have money.  I darn’t sell your diamonds—­at least I don’t want to.  I’d rather you’d have them,” and he seemed to weaken as if with romance when it came to this sentiment.  “As for the bonds—­”

“You’ll never touch them!” she cried, bitterly.  “Isn’t it enough that you have ruined my life?  Now you must—­”

“Oh, stop the theatrical business!” he sneered.  “Pity you didn’t go on the stage.  Now look here.  This is your last chance.  I’ll give you your diamonds if you’ll sign this paper so I can get out of the tangle I’m in.  You’ve got to sign!  It’s your last chance.  If you don’t, by all the—­”

She tore herself away from him, and turned to flee, but he was too quick for her, and was about to encircle her in his arms when she shrank back and gave a despairing cry.

“Don’t—­don’t touch me!”

This seemed to madden the man, for he sprang toward her, fury and threat in every gesture.

“Aaron!  Aaron!  He’s going to kill me!” screamed Cynthia.

Thought was not quicker than the leaping forward of Colonel Ashley.  Out from the shadows he sprang, to whirl back the man who, with blazing eyes and murderous hate written on his face, confronted Cynthia Ratchford.

“What—­what’s this?” snarled the man, struggling to retain his balance.  “What’s this?  Who the devil are you, to come between me and my—­”

“Don’t dare profane that name!” warned the woman.  “I—­I—­ Oh, Aaron! where are you?”

It was very dark now, under the trees.

“Ha!  So that’s who he is!  Your old lover, Grafton!  Well, I’ll soon finish him!  I’ll make him wish he hadn’t come between us with his protecting ways, and his diamond cross that he goes so secretly to have mended.  Bah!  A pretty lover!  Take that, you sneaking fool!”

There was a sliver of flame in the darkness, and mingled with the report came a cry of anguish and a woman’s scream, as a heavy stick in the hands of Colonel Ashley broke the hand that held the revolver.

A little thud among the bushes told where the weapon had fallen, its bullet cutting the tree branches overhead.

“Oh—­who—­who are you?” gasped the woman, as the colonel stepped between her and the man he had maimed.  “I thought Mr. Grafton was—­”