"Ha! Let you go!"
Again he caught her in his arms and pressed her fiercely against him. She felt his hot breath. She saw the veins swelling in his red neck. She struggled and turned her head from side to side, but he buried his face in her neck, in her hair, with little snorts and cries like an animal; then he kissed her furiously on the cheeks, on the forehead and at last full and long on the mouth!
"Ha! Let you go!" he breathed with smothered violence. "I'll let you go when—stop that!" he cried. "You will! You'll bite me?"
With a twinge of pain he drew back for a second, but instantly rushed after her as she sprang away.
And now, in her extreme and imminent peril, Hester took the last chance that remained. Before the madman could get his hands on her again, she screamed with all the power of her lungs—then screamed again.
Anton stood still, his eyes filled with sudden fear, his nostrils dilated. That wild cry had stirred the coward within the beast. And, while he waited, stunned and stupid, Hester's quick wits took control of the situation.
"Listen! I hear a step," she warned him, but, in her sinking heart, she knew that there was no step. No one had heard her. The shrieking of the storm had covered everything. She was as helpless as before.
And while Anton listened in alarm, not yet realizing his advantage, the Storm girl's mind leaped forward to study the next move in the desperate game she was playing. In a moment he would see that there was no danger—no one was coming, no one would come. And then, in gloating reaction, he would come back to his infernal purpose and—God! she must turn him from that before the beast was roused again.
"Anton," she said with swift decision, "I—I did take the money out of the purse."
He stared at her doubtfully.