"'You will stop there,' said she, pointing to a spot a few feet from
where she stood. 'Another step and I let that for which I have heard
you declare you would peril your very soul, fall into the heart of the
flames.' And drawing from her breast a roll of bills, she stretched
them out above the fire before which she was standing.
"'You -----' broke from the gray-bearded lips of the old man, but he
stopped where he was, eyeing those bills as if fascinated.
"'I am not a girl of many words, as you know,' continued she in a
lofty tone inexpressibly commanding. 'You may strangle me, you may
kill me, it matters little; but this gentleman leaves the house this
night, or I destroy the money with a gesture.'
"'You -----' again broke from those quivering lips, but the old man
did not move.
"Not so the younger. With a rush he left his post and in another
instant would have had his powerful arms about her slender form, only
that I met him half way with a blow that laid him on the floor at her
feet. She said nothing, but one of the bills immediately left her hand
and fluttered into the fire where it instantly shrivelled into
nothing.
"With the yell of a mad beast wounded in his most vulnerable spot, the
old man before us stamped with his heel upon the floor.
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