When she came within view, the matter was apparently settled. A swarthy, vividly clad woman cringed against one wall. Against the other Cyrus had pinned a swarthier man. The man, helpless, seemed to be wheedling and promising. With a final shake and a growl--the girl likened it in her mind to that of a great, magnanimous dog--the gaunt one released the Sicilian and stopped to pick up his hat, which had fallen in the struggle. Then the girl's heart leaped and clogged her throat with terror, for, as Cyrus turned, the pretense fell from the face of his opponent and it changed to a mask of murder. His hand darted to his breast and came forth clutching the thin, terrible, homemade stiletto of the rag-picking tribe, a file ground to a rounded needle-point. The girl strove to cry out. It seemed to her only the whisper of a nightmare. But it was enough. Cyrus spun around and leaped back. His arm went out stiff as a bar. At the end of it was a formidable something which flashed with an ugly glint of metal in the Sicilian's face. Whether or not she heard a report, the terror-stricken onlooker could not have said. But the would-be murderer screamed, tottered, withered. His weapon tinkled upon the coping. Then an arm of inordinate size and strength encircled the Bonnie Lassie, whirled her up out of a pit of blackness, and supported her through a reeling world. At her ear a quietly urgent voice kept insisting that she must walk--walk--walk, and not let herself lapse. A shock jolted her brain. It was the smell of ammonia. The darkness dissipated, became an almost intolerable light, and she found herself seated opposite Cyrus the Gaunt at a polished metal table in an ice cream parlor. [Illustration: Whirled her out of a pit of darkness 064] “Don't let go of my hand,” she whispered faintly. His big, reassuring clasp tightened. “We got away before the crowd came,” he said. “You have wonderful nerve. I thought you were gone.” “Don't speak of it,” she shuddered. “I can't stand it.” Not until, after a slow, silent walk, they were seated on a bench in Our Square could she gather her resolution for the dreadful question. “Did you kill him?” “Good Lord, no!” Whirled her up out of a pit of blackness, and supported her through a reeling world. “But--but--you shot him!” “Yes, with this.” He thrust his hand in his pocket, and again, as she closed her eyes against the sight, she caught faintly the pungent stimulus that had revived her. “What is it?” “Ammonia-pop. Model of my own.” Her eyes flew open, the color flooded into her cheeks, but receded again. “He might have killed you!” she exclaimed. “I thought when you turned away and I saw the dagger that-- Oh, how could you take such a desperate chance?” “Just fool-in-the-head, I guess. I supposed he was through. Don't know that breed, you see. But for you, he'd have got me.” “But for _you_,” she retorted, “I don't know what might have happened to me. How came you to be down in that slum?”