ampbell's face.

"Drop that instantly," thundered Miss Campbell in a voice that did not
seem to be her own.

But the force of her splendid will and courage struck home. The carving
knife slipped from Mrs. Lupo's hand and stood upright between them in
the board floor of the porch.

"Get down on your knees," ordered Miss Campbell, and all this time she
had never taken her eyes off Mrs. Lupo's.

The knife was still swaying on the point of its blade, as the woman sank
to the floor in a quivering, sobbing heap.

"What do you mean by coming to me like this?" demanded Miss Campbell.

"Your daughter, she try cut my throat this morning with same. I take
revenge," answered Mrs. Lupo between her sobs.

"Nonsense! Absurd!"

"She have dislike me from first," went on Mrs. Lupo, who seemed to
eliminate all articles from her conversation. "She joke at me. She buy
berries of girl I hate."

Miss Campbell leaned against the rail and watched the woman crouched at
her feet like a whipped dog. Only an instant did she allow the thought
to come to her that she was alone in camp with a half-crazed savage.

"She is a very weak, pitiable object," she said to herself. "I must
manage her and I shall. I am not afraid."

Suddenly she leaned over and put her hand very softly on the woman's
shoulder.

"I am so sorry for you," she said. "Won't you let me help you? I think
you are much too fine and capable to fly into rages like this. What is
the reason of it?"

"Not know," answered Mrs. Lupo. "When they come, I see red. I wish to
break up--kill."

"Do you love your husband?"

"Yes," answered the other with so much eloquence of expression that Miss
Campbell knew she spoke the truth.

"And he loves you?"

"He loves me, but not so much. He leaves me for long time,--alone."

"Has he ever seen you in a rage?"

"Yes," answered Mrs. Lupo in a low voice, her head sinking on her
breast.

"Of course, then, that is why he leaves you. Men like gentleness in a
woman. A violent-tempered wife never keeps her husband's love. If you
were gentle and quiet, your husband would take you with him to the
village. But you are jealous and uncontrolled. You make a spectacle of
yourself and of him. You look very ugly as you looked a while ago, like
an angry animal instead of a handsome young woman. Try being gentle and
always looking pretty and see how it works."

Mrs. Lupo looked up. Miss Campbell had captured her interest and she was
listening to th