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364 "A right," she answered him, "that requires no permission from you."

"You don't deny it, then?"

"I don't deny it."

"And you're not ashamed of it?"

"I'm not ashamed of it. I glory in it."

He had not risen with her, but he pulled himself, now, unsteadily to his feet.

"I've got only one answer to make to that," he said. "You fondle that black-coated, white-livered priest just once more, and I'll send the souls of both of you straight to hell."

"Steve, you coward, what do you mean?"

"Mean? I mean what I say. I'll have what belongs to me or I'll kill the man that robs me, and the woman that lets him. He had his kisses last Friday. I haven't had mine yet. But I'm going to have 'em—to-night."

He started toward her, staggering as he went. She backed away from him and tried to reach the door, but he blocked her path.

"Let me pass!" she cried. "Don't you dare to stop me! Don't you dare to lay a finger on me!"

He paid no heed to her command. He lurched forward, even as she spoke, and before she could escape him he had seized her and crushed her in his arms. She cried out in terror, and tried to free herself, but she was helpless. Half-drunken as he was, he seemed, nevertheless, to be possessed of maniacal strength. Men in the barroom adjoining heard the cry and the struggle, and burst into the room and released her from his grasp, and held her assailant while she hurried away. When he saw that she was gone he became suddenly calm, self-possessed, genial. He showed no resentment toward those who had caught and restrained him. He simulated good-nature as shrewdly and cleverly as do the criminal insane. His captors, now his companions, lent themselves readily to the decep-