“I—I warn you,” she panted, “if you use force, you—you brute, I’ll fight back. I’ll—I’ll——” Mr. Priestley stopped pulling and looked at her with something like despair. “But, good Heavens!” he exclaimed. “In the name of goodness, _why_ don’t you want to?” Laura also stopped pulling in sheer amazement. She could hardly believe her ears. Could this absurd little man really be as incredibly conceited as all that! “You dare ask me that?” she demanded, her bosom heaving. Mr. Priestley rolled his eyes up to the ceiling. He had heard a lot about the unreasonableness of women, but he had never heard anything that came within a mile of this. “Surely it’s an obvious question,” he murmured resignedly. “Well, then, I’ll answer it,” Laura snapped. “Because I hate the sight of you! Now are you satisfied?” It was Mr. Priestley’s turn to look incredulous. Besides being grossly unfair, considering all that had happened that evening, the answer appeared to be that of a complete imbecile. “That seems a very strange reason for wanting to go on being handcuffed to me,” he articulated. “Good Heavens, I don’t want to go on being handcuffed to you! There’s nothing I want less in the world, you—you beast! I—_oh!_” And Laura, the devilish-minded Laura, terror of her brother and all who knew her, buried her face in the crook of her free arm and burst into real tears of mortification and alarm. Mr. Priestley stared at her aghast. So far as he could see, this extraordinary young woman had suddenly gone off her head. After threatening to fight him if he tried their last resource for getting rid of the handcuffs, she was now apparently weeping at the idea of not doing so. Women, in Mr. Priestley’s mind at that moment, was represented by one large question-mark. Then suddenly suspicion invaded him. She had pretended to weep once before, and that time he had been taken in, with horrible consequences. Was it not highly probable that she was doing exactly the same thing again, relying on its previous success? What could possibly be her objection to his proposal. Mr. Priestley was unable to understand, but whatever it was it must be swept aside. He was going to be trifled with no longer. With sudden determination he gathered the drooping body up in his arms and pursued his interrupted journey. “Oh, no!” moaned a despairing voice from somewhere near his left shoulder. For a young woman who had just expressed her determination to fight to the death, Laura felt remarkably limp. But Laura was limp. For some strange reason the stuffing had been knocked out of her just as suddenly as it had arrived. She could not at that moment have stood up to a blue-bottle; and Mr. Priestley was far more formidable than any blue-bottle. Perhaps the strain of the evening had told on her more than she had realised; she was still cold, she was still clammy, her nerves were in shreds and her food had only given her indigestion. She felt like one of her own wet stockings.