With the strength of despair she tore at the cords, half rising to her feet, while with mortal anguish she gasped:
“For God’s sake, spare my baby! Do as you will with me, and kill me—do not touch her!”
Again the huge fist swept her to the floor.
Marion staggered against the wall, her face white, her delicate lips trembling with the chill of a fear colder than death.
“We have no money—the deed has not been delivered,” she pleaded, a sudden glimmer of hope flashing in her blue eyes.
Gus stepped closer, with an ugly leer, his flat nose dilated, his sinister bead eyes wide apart, gleaming apelike, as he laughed:
“We ain’t atter money!”
The girl uttered a cry, long, tremulous, heart-rending, piteous.
A single tiger spring, and the black claws of the beast sank into the soft white throat and she was still.