It was an old trick. There was nothing behind him. But in that instant of desperation instinct had guided her.
Involuntarily he turned.
With a scream of pain she twisted from his grasp and blotted out the candle.
A long, livid pencil of orange flame spurted from the gun-point. She sensed the powder-flare in her face. He had missed.
She scrambled for shelter beneath the table. The cabin was now in inky blackness. Across that black four more threads of scarlet light were laced. The man stumbled about seeking her, cursing with blood-curdling blasphemy.
Suddenly he tripped and went sprawling. The gun clattered from his bruised fingers; it struck the woman's knee.
Swiftly her hand closed upon it. The hot barrel burned her palm.
She was on her feet in an instant. Her left hand fumbled in her blouse, and she found what had been there all along—the flash-lamp.
With her back against the door, she pulled it forth. With the gun thrust forward for action she pressed the button.
"I've got the gun—get up!" she ordered. "Don't come too near me or I'll shoot. Back up against that wall."