danger, and you are
the only man in this town who can help to save him. Come!"

Philip turned to his wife. "Sarah, it is my duty. If anything should
happen to me you know my soul will meet yours at the gates of Paradise."

He kissed her, and rushed out into the night.

CHAPTER IX.

When Philip reached the residence of Mr. Winter, he found himself at
once in the midst of a mob of howling, angry men, who surged over the
lawn and tramped the light snow that was falling into a muddy mass over
the walks and up the veranda steps. A large electric lamp out in the
street in front of the house threw a light over the strange scene.

Philip wedged his way in among the men, crying out his name, and asking
for room to be made so that he could see Mr. Winter. The crowd, under
the impulse which sometimes moves excited bodies of men, yielded to his
request. There were cries of, "Let him have a minister if he wants one!"
"Room here for the priest!" "Give the preacher a chance to do some
praying where it's needed mighty bad!" and so on. Philip found a way
opened for him as he struggled toward the house, and he hurried forward
fearing some great trouble, but hardly prepared for what he saw when he
finally reached the steps of the veranda.

Half a dozen men had the mill-owner in their grasp, having evidently
dragged him out of his dining-room. His coat was half torn off, as if
there had been a struggle. Marks of bloody fingers stained his collar.
His face was white, and his eyes filled with the fear of death.
Within, upon the floor, lay his wife, who had fainted. A son and a
daughter, his two grown-up children, clung terrified to one of the
servants, who kneeled half fainting herself by the side of the
mill-owner's wife. A table overturned and fragments of a late dinner
scattered over the sideboard and on the floor, a broken plate, the print
of a muddy foot on the white tiling before the open fire,--the whole
picture flashed upon Philip like a scene out of the French Revolution,
and he almost rubbed his eyes to know if he was awake and in America in
the nineteenth century. He was intensely practical, however, and the
nature of his duty never for a moment escaped him. He at once advanced
and said calmly:--

"What does all this mean? Why this attack on Mr. Winter?"

The moment Mr. Winter saw Philip and heard his voice he cried out,
trembling: "Is that you, Mr. Strong? Thank God! Save me! They are going
to kill me!"

"Who