As they toiled upward, Macniff heard Skelton fiercely muttering sometimes, sometimes whining curses on this girl who had betrayed them both--who had betrayed him in particular. Over and over again he repeated his dreary litany: "No, by God, I didn't think she'd do it to me. All I want is to get my hooks on her; that's all I want--just that." Toward dawn they had reached the base of the cone where the last rocky slope slanted high above them. "Cripes," panted Macniff, "I can't make that over them rocks! I gotta take it by the path. Wot's the matter, Harry? Wot y' lookin' at?" he added, following Skelton's fascinated stare. Then: "Well, f'r Christ's sake!" The girl, Helsa, was coming toward them through the trees. "Where have you been?" she demanded. "Have you seen the Americans? I've been waiting here beside the path. They haven't passed. I met one of our agents in the woods--there was a misunderstanding at first--" She stopped, stepped nearer, peered into Skelton's shadowy face: "Harry! What's the matter? Wh-why do you look at me that way--what are you doing! Let go of me--" But Skelton had seized her by one arm and Macniff had her by the other. "Are you crazy?" she demanded, struggling between them. Skelton spoke first, but she scarcely recognised the voice for his: "Who was that man you were talking to down by the Swiss wire?" "I've told you. He's one of us. His name is Wolkcer--" "What!" "Wolkcer! That is his name--" "Spell it backward!" barked Skelton. "We know what you have done to us! You have sold us to Recklow! That's what you done!" "W-what!" stammered the girl. But Skelton, inarticulate with rage, began striking her and jerking her about as though he were trying to tear her to pieces. Only when the girl reeled sideways, limp and deathly white under his fury, did he find his voice, or the hoarse unhuman rags of it: "Damn you!" he gasped, "you'll sell me out, will you? I'll show you! I'll fix you, you dirty slut--" Suddenly he started up the path to the summit dragging the half-conscious girl. Macniff ran along on the other side to help. "Wot y' goin' to do with her, Harry?" he panted. "I ain't got no stomach for scraggin' her. I ain't for no knifin'. W'y don't you shove her off the top?" But Skelton strode on, half-dragging the girl, and muttering that she had sold him and that he knew how to "fix" a girl who double-crossed him. And now the gaunt, black Crucifix came into view, stark against the paling eastern sky with its life-sized piteous figure hanging there under the crown of thorns. Macniff looked up at the carved wooden image, then, at a word from Skelton, dropped the girl's limp arm. The girl opened her eyes and stood swaying there, dazed. Skelton began to laugh in an unearthly way: "Where the hell are you Germans?" he called out. "Come out of your holes, damn you. Here's one of your own kind who's sold us all out to the Yankees!"