Emily held Lavelle and Chang in view until they were halfway to the tree
and the Chinaman halted and looked back. It was as if the giant had
flashed a message to her. Her heart gave a throb of apprehension. Her
breath caught in her throat. Her limbs trembled. She realized that she
was alone on the hill with Rowgowskii. Only her own soul knew her
repugnance of this man which had grown with the hours since they had
come to the island.
Even as her mind bore the thought Emily became ashamed of her
trepidation and self-consciousness. It was unworthy of the kind of woman
that Lavelle's fearlessness of soul and fortitude made her desire to be.
Mortified, and with a flush mounting her cheeks at what she considered
her mean selfishness, she turned from the meadow and the stretch of
ocean southward. She walked across the hilltop. North, east, and west
her gaze met an empty blue expanse of water. The hill oscillated and she
swayed with it unconscious of the motion. Her attention was held by the
glint of a white wing high against the cloudless azure sky to the
northward where a frigate bird went seeking a mate.
"Oh, if we but had your wings!" she exclaimed.
"But we haven't," whispered a voice close to her ear. With the words an
evil, burning breath struck her cheek and Rowgowskii's two powerful arms
encircled her.
At the touch there leaped to life in Emily that furious strength which
has been given to women to defend themselves or their offspring from
besoiling or destroying hands.
With a shriek she twisted herself in the brute's clasp and hurled him
from her, but not before he had succeeded in crushing his hot, sensuous
lips against her throat. She struck him in the face with both hands
clenched. Landing where Lavelle had smashed him in the boat the morning
after the wreck of the _Cambodia_, the blows drew blood and swept him
from his feet. He went over backward and, falling, carried with him the
boat mast which was stepped in the center of the hilltop for a signal
staff.
Sending a piercing shriek toward the meadow, Emily ran toward the
southern slope. Rowgowskii staggered up in her path with outstretched
arms as if to stop her. He hesitated and stepped aside. The
unaccountable action arrested Emily.
"Go on yelling!" he said wrathfully. "There is nobody to hear. We are
alone--you and I."
A sight of the meadow confirmed his words. Lavelle and Chang were not
there.
The Russian laughed as she faced him helplessly and incredulously, her
strength, for the moment, gone from her. She had no distinct thought.
The capacity of thinking and feeling seemed to have never been.
"They went like that," the brute went on with a snap of his fingers.
"Just as we are going to go--in a--in a very little while." A lingering
quaver went through the hill. He started cravenly. "Feel that, eh? The
end is very near."
Emily was silent. Her gaze darted away from her torturer and around the
sea. It came to rest for the smallest part of a second on the western
edge of the hill. Determination was born of the thought which the glance
suggested. Here was a means of escape.
The cliff was perhaps an hundred feet from where she stood. If she could
only get over there a step would carry her into the presence of her God
unashamed. Her purpose was formed. There was nothing left for which she
cared to live. The camp fire was between her and her goal, but she
heeded it not.
Rowgowskii's gaze, following every movement of the glorious figure of
womanhood before him, set the fires of his fiendishness flaming in new
desire. He advanced a step in front of her. She retreated a step.
"I wonder if you would have treated Lavelle this way if he had come to
love you? Eh?"
There was no answer for him, but Emily's lips moved in murmuring what
her numbed senses could recall of Lavelle's prayer for grace.
"Would you have treated him this way? Tell me, _ma beauté_," he leered.
He took another step toward her. Again she retreated. Still advancing,
the passion of the brute in his eyes scorching her, he said:
"Death will not be so unpleasant. You are very beautiful. You----"
His voice broke in a stammer. A piece of burning sod rolled out of the
fire behind his prey.
"Look out!" he cried.
Emily gave no heed. She put one foot on the sod and smoke curled up
where it burned through the sole of the canvas sandal which Chang had
made for her. Then she lifted the other foot beside it.
Nor did this woman cry out in pain nor a feature so much as wince. An
immortal glory was in her countenance. The look she bent on the man
before her sent him back, cowering in fear and awe.