s of some
tramping, villainous, degraded loafer. And yet, with it all, the old
tree looked so mighty, so wise.

To her it seemed like some ages-old creature looking down from its
immense height, and out of its experience of centuries, upon a world
of struggling beings, with the pitying contempt of a wisdom beyond the
understanding of man. It seemed to her the embodiment of evil, yet
withal of wisdom, too. And somehow she loved it. Its evil meant
nothing to her, nothing more than the evil of the life amid which she
lived. It was no mere passing sentiment with her. Her nature was too
strong for the softer, womanish sentiments, stirred in a moment and as
easily set aside. For her to yield her affections to any creature or
object, was to yield herself to a bondage more certain than any life
of slavery. To think of this valley without----

Her thoughts were abruptly cut short as the sound of a cry reached her
from the direction of her house.

She turned, and, for a moment, stared hard and alertly in the
direction whence it came. Her ears were straining, too. In a moment
she became aware of a faint confusion of sounds which she had no power
of interpreting. But somehow they conveyed an ominous suggestion to
her keen mind.

She bestirred herself. She set off at a run for her home. The distance
was less than a hundred yards, and she covered it quickly. As she came
nearer the sounds grew, and became even more ominous. They proceeded
from somewhere in the direction of the barn behind the house.

She darted into the house, and, after one comprehensive glance around
the sitting room, where she found the rocker upset, and a china
ornament fallen from its place on the table, and smashed in fragments
upon the floor, as though someone had knocked it down in a hasty
departure, she snatched a revolver from its holster upon the wall, and
rushed out of the house through the back door.

She was not mistaken. Her hearing had accurately conveyed to her the
meaning of those sounds.

Nevertheless she was wholly unprepared for the sight which actually
greeted her as she turned the angle of the barn where the building
faced away from the house.

She stood stock still, her big eyes wide with wonder and swift rising
anger. Twisting, struggling, writhing, cursing, two men lay upon the
ground held in a fierce embrace, much in the manner of two wildcats.
Beyond them, huddled upon the ground, her face covered with her hands,
a picture of abj