Page:Arthur Stringer - Twin Tales.djvu/296

286 tresses raise the whip in her hand he realized what was taking place.

He forgot about the crumpled canvas in the narrow marble basin. He ran for the claw that held the whip, caught it and twisted it back. With almost one and the same movement he wrested the rawhide from that shaking claw and sent the bony figure tumbling back over a headless winged lion in marble.

"You muckers! Oh, you muckers!" he cried out, reverting in his excitement to the language of his school-days. Then he turned back to the easel. "Oh, God! Oh, God!" he kept mumbling as he tugged at the knotted cotton rope, for he could see two stripes of red across the whiteness of the stooping slender back.

The girl's face, when he had set her free, was as white as the shoulders from which the clothing had been stripped. She said nothing. She did not even raise her eyes to his. But she drew back as he essayed a futile effort to lift her fallen waist up about her naked shoulders. His hands were shaking and the thick air stung his throat.