ber, when I learn to take
things as they come, just like a man--a strong man, then I'll
be----" She stopped.

"Be what?"

"Ready."

"Ready for what?"

"How do I know?"

He swung himself to a sitting position. "Meanwhile, you're
coming to live with me. I've been fighting against it, but I
give up. I need you. You're the one I've been looking for.
Pack your traps. I'll call a cab and we'll go over to my flat.
Then we'll go to Rector's and celebrate."

She shook her head. "I'm sorry, but I can't."

"Why not?"

"I told you. There's something in me that won't let me."

He rose, walked to her very deliberately. He took one of her
hands from her lap, drew her to her feet, put his hands
strongly on her shoulders. "You belong to me," he said, his
lips smiling charmingly, but the devil in the gleam of his eyes
and in the glistening of his beautiful, cruel teeth. "Pack up."

"You know that I won't."

He slowly crushed her in his arms, slowly pressed his lips upon
hers. A low scream issued from her lips and she seized him by
the throat with both hands, one hand over the other, and thrust
him backward. He reeled, fell upon his back on the bed; she
fell with him, clung to him--like a bull dog--not as if she
would not, but as if she could not, let go. He clutched at her
fingers; failing to dislodge them, he tried to thrust his
thumbs into her eyes. But she seized his right thumb between
her teeth and bit into it until they almost met. And at the
same time her knees ground into his abdomen. He choked,
gurgled, grew dark red, then gray, then a faint blackish blue,
lay limp under her. But she did not relax until the blue of
his face had deepened to black and his eyes began to bulge from
their sockets. At those signs that he was beyond doubt
unconscious, she cautiously relaxed her fingers. She
unclenched her teeth; his arm, which had been held up by the
thumb she was biting, dropped heavily. She stood over him, her
eyes blazing insanely at him. She snatched out her hatpin,
flung his coat and waistcoat from over his chest, felt for his
heart. With the murderous eight inches of that slender steel
poniard poised for the drive, she began to sob, flung the
weapon away, took his face between her hands and kissed him.

"You fiend! You fiend!" she sobbed.

She changed to her plainest dress. Leaving the blood-stained
blouse on the bed beside him where she had flung it down after
tearing it off, she tur