jah lifted his face.

"Lord God!" he said, "give me strength. It is more than I can bear!"

"Go!" commanded the master of the Garden.

Elijah turned slowly away. As if to show the way, Timeh galloped before
him.

_CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE_

David watched them go, and while his back was turned a fierce, soft
dialogue passed between Ruth Manning and Ben Connor.

"Are you a man?" she asked him, through her set teeth. "Are you going to
let that beautiful little thing die?"

"I'd rather see the cold-hearted fool die in place of Timeh. But what
can we do? Nothing. Just smile in his face."

"I hate him!" she exclaimed.

"If you hate him, then use him. Will you?"

"If I can make him follow me, tease him to come, make him think I love
him, I'll do it. I'd do anything to torture him."

"I told you he was a savage."

"You were right, Ben. A fiend--not a man! Oh, thank Heavens that I see
through him."

Anger gave her color and banished her tears. And when David turned he
found what seemed a picture of pleasure. It was infinitely grateful to
him. If he had searched and studied for the words he could not have
found anything to embitter her more than his first speech.

"And what do you think of the justice of David?" he asked, coming to
them.

She could not speak; luckily Connor stepped in and filled the gap of
awkward silence.

"A very fine thing to have done, Brother David," he said. "Do you know
what I thought of when I heard you talk?"

"Of what?" said David, composing his face to receive the compliment. At
that Ruth turned suddenly away, for she dared not trust her eyes, and
the hatred which burned in them.

"I thought of the old story of Abraham and Isaac. You were offering up
something as dear to you as a child, almost, to the law of the Garden of
Eden."

"It is true," said David complacently. "But when the flesh is diseased
it must be burned away."

He called to Ruth: "And you, Ruth?"

This childish seeking after compliments made her smile, and naturally he
misjudged the smile.

"I think with Benjamin," she said softly.

"Yet my ways in the Garden must seem strange to you," went on David,
expanding in the warmth of his own sense of virtue. "But you will grow
accustomed to them, I know."

The opening was patent. She was beginning to nod her acquiescence when
Connor, in alarm, tapped on the table, once and again in swift
telegraphy: "No! No!"

The faint smile went out on her face.

"No," sh