as
going to use it to cut her throat.

She saw Crumb take the knife and feel of the blade, running his thumb
along it. She saw him stoop, his eyes turned down upon hers. He grasped
her chin and forced it upward and back, the better to expose her throat.

Oh, why could she not faint? Why must she suffer all these hideous
preliminaries? Why could she not even close her eyes?

Crumb raised the knife and held the blade close above her bared neck. A
shudder ran through her, and then the door crashed open and a man sprang
into the room. It was Billy Byrne. Through the window he had seen what
was passing in the interior.

His hand fell upon Crumb's collar and jerked him backward from his prey.
Dink seized the shotgun and turned it upon the intruder; but he was too
close. Billy grasped the barrel of the weapon and threw the muzzle up
toward the ceiling as the tramp pulled the trigger. Then he wrenched it
from the man's hands, swung it once above his head and crashed the stock
down upon Dink's skull.

Dink went down and out for the count--for several counts, in fact. Crumb
stumbled to his feet and made a break for the door. In the doorway he
ran full into Bridge, winded, but ready. The latter realizing that the
matted one was attempting to escape, seized a handful of his tangled
beard, and, as he had done upon another occasion, held the tramp's head
in rigid position while he planted a series of blows in the fellow's
face--blows that left Crumb as completely out of battle as was his
mildewed comrade.

"Watch 'em," said Billy, handing Bridge the shotgun. Then he turned his
attention to the woman. With the carving knife that was to have ended
her life he cut her bonds. Removing the gag from her mouth he lifted
her in his strong arms and carried her to the little horsehair sofa that
stood in one corner of the parlor, laying her upon it very gently.

He was thinking of "Maw" Watson. This woman resembled her just a
little--particularly in her comfortable, motherly expansiveness, and she
had had a kind word and a cheery good-bye for him that morning as he had
departed.

The woman lay upon the sofa, breathing hard, and moaning just a little.
The shock had been almost too much even for her stolid nerves. Presently
she turned her eyes toward Billy.

"You are a good boy," she said, "and you come just in the nick o' time.
They got all my money. It's in their clothes," and then a look of terror
overspread her face. For the moment