And then, with a cry of joy she sprang away from him and leaning quickly down grasped one of the pieces of driftwood with which the sand was strewn. The stick whistled through the air and descended upon Sid’s head, knocking him to his knees. “You, you!” he stuttered and then cried out. “Hey, rubes!” he called and two of his companions, who had been standing at the door of the dance hall, ran toward him. Swinging the stick about her head May ran past them and in her nervous fright struck Sid again. In her mind the thing that was happening was in some odd way connected with the affair in the wood with Jerome. It was the same affair. Sid Gould and Jerome were one man, they stood for the same thing, were the same thing. They were something strange and terrible she had to meet, with which she had to struggle. The thing they represented had defeated her once, had got the best of her. She had surrendered to it, had opened the gates that led into the tower of romance, that was herself, that walled in her own secret and precious life. Something terribly crude, without understanding had happened then—it must not, could not happen again! She had been a child and had understood nothing but now she did understand. There was a thing within herself that must not be touched by unclean hands. A terrible fear of people swept over her. There was Maud Welliver, whom she had tried to take as a friend, and Lillian who had tried to be a sister to her, had wanted to help her achieve life. As for Maud—she knew nothing, she was a child—and Lillian was crude, she understood nothing. May’s mind put all men in a class with Jerome Hadley. There was something men wanted from women, that Jerome had wanted and now this other man, Sid Gould. They were all, like the Edgleys—Lillian and Kate and the two boys—people who went after the thing they wanted brutally, directly. That was not May’s way and she decided she wanted nothing more to do with such people. “I’ll never go back to Bidwell,” she kept saying over and over as she ran in the uncertain light along the beach. Sid Gould’s companions, having run out of the dance hall, could not understand that he had been knocked over by the slight girl he had led into the darkness, and when they heard his curses and groans and saw him reeling about, quite overcome by the second blow May had aimed at his head—combined with the liquor within—they imagined some man had come to May’s rescue. When they ran forward and saw May with the stick in her hand and swinging it wildly about they paid little attention to her but began at once looking for her companion. Two of them followed May as she ran along the beach and the others returned to the dance hall. A group of young farmers came crowding to the door and Cal Mosher hit one of them a swinging blow with his fist. “Get out of the way,” he cried, “we’re going to clean up this place.”