nnie went flying from a violent shove, likewise the silent man.

"Come here--you!" bawled Jim.

Tom came forward, his ugly face curved in a look of intense hate. He felt
Jim snatch the revolver from his belt and pocket it.

"What's your lay?" he growled.

Jim put his own revolver away and Tom's hands dropped to his side.

"So you took a fancy to my property, eh?"

Tom recoiled before the blazing eyes of his adversary. He was big and
hefty enough, but no match for the well-proportioned, muscular giant
before him. He was good at assessing physical values, and he felt scared.

"She's mine," he said. "I won her."

Angela, crouching at the end of the room, saw the storm brewing. She
suddenly remembered the knife, and retrieved it lest one of the trio
should lay hands on it. She saw Connie and his silent friend edging behind
Jim, and one quick glance from Tom's vile face told her that the three
were filled with a common purpose. Connie suddenly snatched up a log of
wood.

"Jim!" she cried, as the three men suddenly sprang forward.

The big figure moved like a streak of lightning. Tom was caught by two
powerful arms and lifted clean off his feet. He hung for one brief second,
six inches from the ground, and then executed an arc in thin air to come
down with a crash against the match-boarded wall. The other two were
close upon him. He dealt with the log-swinging man first. Connie's arm was
already raised and the thick piece of wood was on the point of coming
down. Had it descended, the Honorable Angela might have been a widow there
and then, but a fifty-inch leg prevented that untimely catastrophe. It
came out from Jim's thigh, true in the horizontal plane, and smote Connie
in the tenderest part of his anatomy. He made no sound whatever, but
dropped in a crumpled heap and lay still. The silent man was caught in
mid-air. He had never expected the amazingly quick movement of the arms
that held him. He was a miserable specimen, physically, and turned green
when he saw the big fist drawn back to strike.

"No, you ain't big enough to hit," said Jim. "You seem to like me; come
closer honey, come close!"

He gathered the man close in and, exerting all his strength, crushed every
atom of breath from the man's body. Angela, sick with the sight of this
animal manifestation, protested.

"You'll kill him! He never did me any harm."

Jim dropped his victim with a grunt. A queer reaction set in. He was
sorry. He could have re