“That won’t suit me,” answered Miles. “I have told you before, if gentle means won’t succeed I must use force, though I am sorry for it,” and he again began to drag her forward.
May, though now more alarmed than ever, recovered her voice, and made use of it by uttering a loud shriek. It might have been heard at Downside, and Miles seemed to think that it was, for he turned his head anxiously in that direction, expecting apparently to see some one issue from the gate.
May, struggling to get free, looked also the same way. Again she uttered a cry for help. At the same moment a man bounded round the corner of the road, and before Miles was aware of his approach, he was laid prostrate on the ground by a blow from Jacob Halliburt’s powerful fist. “Run, Miss May, run,” he exclaimed, “there are other men coming, but I will settle this one before they are here.”
May instinctively ran to the gate. No sooner had she gained it than she turned round intending to beckon Jacob to follow her to the house, and to leave the wretched man without inflicting further punishment on him. As she did so she saw Jacob lifting Miles on his feet. Scarcely was he up than Jacob, telling him to defend himself, again knocked him down.
Jacob, as soon as he had done so, seeing that she had not reached the house, again entreated her to hurry there.
“If you will go I will follow you in a moment,” he shouted, “you won’t be safe till then.”
As Jacob spoke she saw four armed men on horseback galloping along the road. Believing that Jacob was following close behind her she rushed into the house. He sprang toward the gate intending to defend it should the horsemen, as he thought they would, attempt to enter. Had he possessed any weapon he might have held his post, but in another instant one of the horsemen dealt him a blow with the butt end of a pistol, which laid him senseless on the ground.
By this time Miles had began to recover his courage, and one of the men leaping from his horse helped him up. A gleam of satisfaction lighted up his eyes as he saw what had occurred to Jacob.
“If it hadn’t been for that fellow I should have kept the girl till you came up,” he exclaimed. “Let us make sure of him at all events, and I will manage to get hold of her another time when there will be no one to interfere.”