"Harper Elliston, how dare you insult me in this way? Do you imagine that I would for one moment countenance anything so base? You have missed your mark if you imagine you can frighten me into consenting to my own ruin."
"It may be accomplished without your consent."
Such a look as swept his face startled the girl. The hideous nature of the man was now revealed in all its naked deformity. She shrank from him as she would have shrunk from a venomous serpent.
He continued to smile and stroke his glossy beard.
"You see how it is, my dear," he proceeded. "The wisest thing you can do is to submit to the inevitable."
He advanced as lie spoke.
She recoiled with a shudder of wild alarm.
"Back, scoundrel! Do not touch me!" she cried, warningly, an indignant, perhaps dangerous, fire blazing in her eye.
Again the demon laughed.
"You seem to take my love-making hard, Miss Darrel."