be a model son and a loving
husband and a tender father. Margaret was filled with a vague alarm.

But she was brave, was Margaret. "No," said she, very decidedly, "I
shan't give you another cent. So you climb right over that wall and go
straight back where you belong."

The methods of Mr. Flinks, I regret to say, were somewhat more crude
than those of Mesdames Haggage and Saumarez and Messieurs Kennaston
and Jukesbury.

"Cheese it!" said Mr. Flinks, and flung away his staff and drew very
near to her. "Gimme that money, do you hear!"

"Don't you dare touch me!" she panted; "ah, don't you _dare_!"

"Aw, hell!" said Mr. Flinks, disgustedly, and his dirty hands were
upon her, and his foul breath reeked in her face.

In her hour of need Margaret's heart spoke.

"Billy!" she wailed; "oh, Billy, _Billy_!"

* * * * *

He came to her--just as he would have scaled Heaven to come to her,
just as he would have come to her in the nethermost pit of Hell if she
had called. Ah, yes, Billy Woods came to her now in her peril, and
I don't think that Mr. Flinks particularly relished the look upon
Billy's face as he ran through the gardens, for Billy was furiously
moved.

Cock-eye Flinks glanced back at the wall behind him. Ten feet high,
and the fellow ain't far off. Cock-eye Flinks caught up his staff, and
as Billy closed upon him, struck him full on the head. Again and again
he struck him. It was a sickening business.

Billy had stopped short. For an instant he stood swaying on his feet,
a puzzled face showing under the trickling blood. Then he flung out
his hands a little, and they flapped loosely at the wrists, like
wet clothes hung in the wind to dry, and Billy seemed to crumple up
suddenly, and slid down upon the grass in an untidy heap.

"Ah-h-h!" said Mr. Flinks. He drew back and stared stupidly at that
sprawling flesh which just now had been a man, and was seized with
uncontrollable shuddering. "Ah-h-h!" said Mr. Flinks, very quietly.

And Margaret went mad. The earth and the sky dissolved in many
floating specks and then went red--red like that heap yonder. The
veneer of civilisation peeled, fell from her like snow from a shaken
garment. The primal beast woke and flicked aside the centuries' work.
She was the Cave-woman who had seen the death of her mate--the brute
who had been robbed of her mate.

"Damn you! _Damn_ you!" she screamed, her voice high, flat, quite
unhuman; "ah, God