, his white teeth, and his easy, suave manner. Their glances
battled again for a moment across the distance.

"Why did you bring me here?" she demanded abruptly.

He spread his feet outward and hummed, toying the while with a smooth
white chin.

"Sit down," said he, with assumed politeness.

Jinnie stared at him with contemptuous dread in her eyes.

"I don't want to; I want to know why I'm here."

"Can't you guess?" asked the stranger with an easy shrug.

"No," said Jinnie. "Why?"

"And you can't guess who I am?"

"No," repeated Jinnie once more, passionately, "and I want to know why
I'm here."

He came toward her, piercing her face with a pair of compelling,
mesmeric eyes that made her stagger back to the wall. Then he advanced
a step nearer, covering the space Jinnie had yielded.

"I'm Jordan Morse," he then said, clipping his words off shortly.

If a gun had burst in Jinnie's face, she could have been no more
alarmed. She was frozen to silence, and every former fear her father
had given life to almost three years before, beset her once more, only
with many times the amount of vigor. Nevertheless, she gave back look
for look, challenge for challenge, while her fingers locked and
interlocked. Her uncle, who had sent her father to his grave, the man
who wanted her money, who desired her own death!

Then her eyes slowly took on a tragic expression. She knew then she
was destined to encounter the tragedy of Morse's terrific vengeance,
and no longer wondered why her father had succumbed to his force. He
stood looking at her, his gaze taking in the young form avidiously.

"You're the most beautiful girl in the world," he averred presently.

Jinnie's blue eyes narrowed angrily. However, in spite of her rage,
she was terribly frightened. An instinct of self-preservation told her
to put on a bold, aggressive front.

"Give me that key and let me go," she insisted, with an upward toss of
her head.

She walked to the door and shook it vigorously. Morse followed her and
brought her brutally back to the center of the room.

"Not so fast," he grated. "Don't ever do that again! I've been hunting
you for almost three years.... Sit down, I said."

"I won't!" cried Jinnie, recklessly. "I won't! You can't keep me here.
My friends'll find me."

The man hazarded a laugh.

"What friends?" he queried.

Jinnie thought quickly. What friends? She had no friends just then,
and because she knew she was dependent upon h