ITH Henley the next day passed like some fascinating dream. He was busy in various ways as usual, and yet scarcely for a moment were his thoughts away from his new-found delight. He had no hope, bound as he was to another to whom he owed his honor, of ever being closer to Dixie than he was now, and yet there was something in the very purity of his possession of her heart and in her willing sacrifice of so much for the principle which guided her that lifted him into new and untrodden fields of spiritual ecstasy.
It was near sunset, and he stood in the front doorway of the store, looking out into the quiet square, when, to his surprise and with a tumultuous throbbing of his heart, he saw Dixie pass with a letter in her hand on the way to the post-office. She was on the opposite side of the street and did not glance in his direction, and he made no effort to attract her attention. As she passed along by old Welborne's diminutive office Henley noticed that Hank Bradley, who had been drinking about town through the day, came from the doorway and bowed to her conspicuously, his slouch-hat almost sweeping the pavement as he bent downward. She passed on with a bare nod and quickened her step till she entered the post-office, a few doors farther on.
There was something in this, remembering as he did that Bradley had persistently pursued the girl with attentions, which not only angered Henley, but filled him with concern for her safety. The half-drunken brute might take it into his head to follow her down the lonely road which she had to traverse to reach her house. So, with these things in mind, Henley told Cahews that he was going home, and he walked out to the first densely shaded part of the road and, retiring into the bushes, sat on the grass, determined that he would at least follow in her wake till she was out of danger of being accosted.
The sunlight had quite disappeared now, and the fringe of dusk was settling over the silent wood. He was growing impatient, and wondering if anything could have happened to detain Dixie in town, when he beard voices down the road. He stood up and peered through the curtain of wild vines which hung between him and the open. He could see no one, and the voices were so indistinct that he failed to recognize them. But the conversing individuals were evidently rapidly approaching, for their voices were growing louder. Both seemed to be talking at the same time, and Henley was pretty sure that it was a man and a woman. Then the coarser voice drowned the finer and fainter, and Henley recognized it as belonging to Bradley.
"I've been put off and fooled and deviled by you as long as I'm going to be!" the brute cried out. "You are a beautiful young devil, that's what you are. I've offered you every inducement a man could offer. If I'm drunk, you are the cause of it. I can't think of nothing but you—you, with your maddening eyes of fire and cheeks full of hot blood. I want you. I want you every minute I draw breath. You must listen to reason. I've got plenty of money. We could live like a king and queen on the fat of the land, as God means men and women to live, full of joy and life. Stop, you've got to kiss me! We are alone; nobody is about."
"Let me pass, I tell you, let me pass!" Dixie's terrified voice rose to a shriek, and then it ended in a smothered sound as if a hand had been placed over her mouth. Henley was sure they were struggling and he sprang into the road. Swaying back and forth against the dark background of the wood, he saw Bradley with the girl in his arms. Dixie had ducked her head to avoid his repulsive lips, and the assailant's back was turned to Henley. With the bound of a panther he reached them just as Dixie was eluding Bradley's embrace and trying to release her hand, to which he clung with a grip of steel. Neither of the two saw Henley, and it was a crushing blow from the storekeeper's fist against the side of Bradley's head that showed him what he had to contend with. He had scarcely taken another breath before Henley struck him again with the force of a sledgehammer squarely between the eyes. Bradley staggered, swayed, grew limp, and went down. His eyes rolled back in his head till the whites were exposed. He quivered through his whole form, drew his shoulders up once, and then lay still. Henley, his hands clinched, the eyes of an infuriated animal in his head, his great mouth hanging open, stood over the fallen man.
"Thank God, oh, thank God!" It was Dixie's voice behind him, and he turned to see her at the edge of the road, her face as white as death could have made it, her hands convulsively clasped in front of her. "Oh, Alfred, Alfred, if you hadn't come—" She came to him, but, primitive man that he now was, there seemed to be no place in him for tenderness. His great breast heaved, his lips quivered, his eyes bulged from their sockets. She was about to put out her hands in an effort toward soothing him when, glancing toward Bradley, she uttered a scream of alarm. He was rising, a drawn revolver in his hand. Quick as his approach had been, Henley's next movement was quicker; before the weapon was fairly poised he had knocked it from Bradley's grasp. Contemptuously kicking it out of his reach, Henley gave the man a sharp blow with his fist; and while Bradley was impotently shielding his face with his arms, Henley picked up the revolver, cocked it, and directed it toward him.
"Apologize to this lady," he said, huskily, "and do it quick, for I'm going to blow your brains out. Down on your knees, you dirty whelp—down, I say!"
"I'll be damned if I do."