Diana’s heart went out to the woman. Her loneliness, the atmosphere of tragedy which now enveloped her, called for tenderness and help.
“I ought to have realised that,” she said gently. “I’m sorry I was sharp.”
The great strategist is he who recognises the moment when his enemy is wavering. Heloise brought up her heavy guns.
“I was a good woman before I met him,” she said with a little sob. Gordon, a horrified listener, came gasping into the kitchen.
“You—you——!”
“Silence!”
Under the flashing eyes of Diana Ford his courage failed. Like the fisherman’s wife, he could only stand and watch and suffer.
“He just naturally dragged me down.” Heloise was playing for safety and freedom, and she was a champion player.
Diana’s voice quivered as she turned on the shrinking man.
“You brute! To think that a man like you should be allowed to prey upon humanity! I suspected something like this! You are a human tiger, unfit to live—Why don’t you leave him, Heloise?” she asked tenderly.