wild
with terror--she was conscious of feeling hardly any fear.

And what of Eustace himself? Lucky, indeed, that his judgment was
strong, his brain habitually clear and unclouded. For at that moment
his mind could only be compared to the seething, misty rush of a
whirlpool. He could see her face in the starlight--even the lustrous
glow of the great eyes--could mark the clear outline or the delicate
profile turned half away from him. He was alone with her in the sweet,
soft African night--alone with her--her sole protector, amid the
brooding peril that threatened. A silence had fallen between them. His
love--his concealed and hopeless love for her overcame him. He could
not command words--not even voice, for the molten, raging fires of
passion which consumed him as he sat there. His hand clenched the arm
of his cane chair--a jagged nail, which protruded, lacerating it nearly
to the bone--still he felt nothing of physical pain--mind triumphed.

Yes, the anguish of his mind was so intense as to be akin to physical
pain. Why could they not be thus together always? They could, but for
one life. One life only, between him and such bliss that the whole
world should be a bright and golden paradise! One life! A legion of
fiends seemed to wrestle within the man's raging soul. "One life!" they
echoed in jibbering, gnashing chorus. "One life!" they seemed to shriek
aloud in his brain. "What more easily snapped than the cord of a life?"

The tumultuous thunder of the fierce war-dance sounded louder and louder
upon the night--the glare of the distant fires reddened, and then glowed
forth afresh. What if Tom Carhayes had come upon the spoor of his
missing sheep--and in his blind rage had followed it right into Nteya's
location? Might he not as well walk straight into a den of lions? The
savage Gaikas, wound up to the highest pitch of bloodthirsty excitement,
would at such a time be hardly less dangerous than so many beasts of
prey. Even at that very moment the cord of that one life might be
snapped.

Suddenly a great tongue of flame shot up into the night, then another
and another. From a hilltop the red and threatening beacons flashed
forth their message of hate and defiance. The distant tumult of the
savage orgy had ceased. A weird and brooding silence lay upon the
surrounding country.

"Oh, what does it mean? What does it all mean?" cried Eanswyth starting
up from her chair. Her face was white with f