Endeavoring to restrain her breathing, so that she could endure the choking as long as possible, she threw a quick glance about her. Within reach was the pistol that the officer had torn from Ben's hand, and had, in his subsequent haste, evidently forgotten.
She shuddered as she caught sight of it, but at that moment the fingers resumed a closer hold.
She gave herself a fierce wrench, and endeavored to turn herself in the terrible grasp, but she was like a piece of metal held by a trip-hammer.
Under the strain of hideous necessity, she put out her hand and grasped the revolver.
In it she saw the only hope of life, but what a frightful hope it was! Still there was not an instant to lose.
It seems to require a hundred words in cold type to describe the action of a second, for certainly it was not much longer than that before the little weapon of death was clasped firmly in Leonie's hands.
Unaccustomed as she was to the handling of such instruments, and further affected by the terror of the moment, her finger came first in contact with the trigger.
It was self-acting, and before she realized that it was really in her possession, there was a frightful explosion, and the next moment she felt the hands drop from her throat.
The concussion put the light out, and she was in absolute darkness, with death and lunacy!
It was not an enviable position, most particularly as she had no idea of the extent of the damage done by the pistol.