The men were beyond conviction.  “Why didn’t you”—­do this or that? the tall man kept asking, and his fat comrade exploded, “Yea, vy?” They seemed to demand of her that she should accept blame without question; and to her answers, clear and ready, the fat man retorted with a gross oath.

“Excuse me, sir,” began Dawson, shocked.  He was aching to be on the woman’s side.

“Vott” demanded the fat man.

“That’s hardly the way to speak to a lady,” said Dawson gravely.

The tall man burst into a clear laugh, and the fat man glared at Dawson.  He flinched somewhat, but caught the woman’s eye and found comfort and reinforcement there.  She, too, was smiling, but gratefully, and she gave him a courteous little nod of thanks.

“I don’t like to hear such language used to a lady,” he said, speaking manfully enough, and giving the fat man eyes as steady as his own.  “No gentleman would do it, I’m sure.”

“Vot der hell you got to do mit it?” demanded the other ferociously, while his companion laughed.

The woman held up a hand.  “Do not quarrel,” she said.  “There is trouble enough already.  Besides, they may be here any moment.  Is there anything to get ready?”

“But vot der hell,” cried the fat man again.  She turned on him.

“Fool! fool!  Will you shout and curse all night, till the algemas are on you?”

“Yes; an’ you put dem on us,” the tall man interrupted.

She turned swiftly on him, poising her small head over her bare breasts with a superb scorn.

“Why do you lie?” she demanded hotly.  “Why do you lie?  Must you hide even from your own blame behind my skirts?  Mother of God!”—­an outstretched hand called the tawdry Virgin on the wall to witness—­ “you are neither man nor good beast—­just——­”

The tall man interrupted.  “Don’ go, on!” he said quietly.  “Don’ go on!” His eyes were shining, and he carried one hand beneath his coat.  “Don’ dare to go on!”

“Dare!” The woman lifted her face insolently, brought up her bare arm with a slow sweep, and puffed once at an imaginary cigarette.  There was so much of defiance in the action that Dawson, watching her, breathless, started to his feet with something hard and heavy in his hand.  It was the image.

“Thief!” said the woman slowly, gazing under languorous eyelids at the white, venomous face of the tall man.  “Thief and——­” she leaned forward and said the word, the ultimate and supreme insult of the coast.

It was barely said when there flashed something in the man’s hand.  He was poised on his toes, leaning forward a little, his arm swinging beside him.  The woman flung both arms before her face and cried out; then leaned rapidly aside as a pointed knife whizzed past her head and struck twanging in the wall behind her.  The man sprang forward, and the next instant the room was chaos, for Dawson, tingling to his extremities, stepped in and spread him out with a crashing blow on the head.  The “idol” was his weapon.