“Tina Kellar! I found my daughter shedding tears the other day at the news of her death! Do you blame me if the poor woman was overworked? What was I to do? She was too proud to take anything _but_ work, else, I assure you, she should have had money enough and to spare; but she was well paid and well treated!” “Well paid?” it was Karl Metzerott who replied, “and what right had you to the money you doled out to her? How did you get it? Robber! thief! swindler! we will hang you at your own door, and burn the house down over your head.” Henry Randolph made one step in the direction of the speaker. “Do you think I do not know your voice?” he cried; “but for your son’s sake I forbear to call your name. Come on, cowards, thousands of you against one, and he unarmed. Come on, if you dare!” The crowd swayed back and forth with angry murmurs, but did not advance. Henry Randolph turned quickly to his companion. “Your turn,” he said in a low voice; “I scarcely think they have recognized you yet.” Louis came forward out of the dense shadows that had hitherto protected him, to the front of the pillared veranda. The red light of a torch shone full upon his young, slender figure; never was there a fairer mark for a traitor! He raised his hand to remove his hat, that his face might be clearly seen; but even as he did so,—a flash—a sharp, deadly ring— Henry Randolph caught the falling figure in his arms,—shot through the heart. “Fools! murderers! beast!” he cried in a voice nor man nor woman who heard it ever forgot, “you have killed the only true man among you! You have shot Louis Metzerott.” Then, with a horrible cry, Karl Metzerott leaped upon the veranda, tearing his son’s body from the arms that sustained it, and hurling the sustainer back against a heavy marble vase, which swayed upon its pedestal, then fell sidewise upon Henry Randolph’s prostrate form. But, save that terrible cry, no sound came from the father’s lips as he pressed his hand upon the red stream that welled from his son’s bosom. And over all the throng there fell the silence of awe and horror, until it was broken by a single voice, the voice of the Herr Pastor. “‘Vengeance is mine; _I will repay_,’ saith the Lord.” CHAPTER VIII. “THAT, APART FROM US, THEY SHOULD NOT BE MADE PERFECT.” There was no effort made to exact revenge for Louis Metzerott’s young life. Long before the police arrived (those at headquarters _not_ having had the sense to mount them), his body, still held fast in his father’s arms, had been removed to his home; and there laid upon the bed from which only that morning—