"I believe I'd rather not talk about that. I shall have to win back the confidence I have lost. I shall have to take a place at the head of my clan by proving myself a man--and a man by their own standards. It is only at their head that I can lead them. If the lives of a few assassins have to be forfeited, I sha'n't hesitate at that. I shall stake my own against them fairly. The end is worth it." The girl breathed deeply, then she heard Samson's voice again: "Drennie, I want you to understand, that if I succeed it is your success. You took me raw and unfashioned, and you have made me. There is no way of thanking you." "There is a way," she contradicted. "You can thank me by feeling just that way about it." "Then, I do thank you." She sat looking up at him, her eyes wide and questioning. "Exactly what do you feel, Samson," she asked. "I mean about me?" He leaned a little toward her, and the fragrance and subtle beauty of her stole into his veins and brain, in a sudden intoxication. His hand went out to seize hers. This beauty which would last and not wither into a hag's ugliness with the first breath of age--as mountain beauty does--was hypnotizing him. Then, he straightened and stood looking down. "Don't ask me that, please," he said, in a carefully controlled voice. "I don't even want to ask myself. My God, Drennie, don't you see that I'm afraid to answer that?" She rose from her seat, and stood for just an instant rather unsteadily before him, then she laughed. "Samson, Samson!" she challenged. "The moon is making us as foolish as children. Old friend, we are growing silly. Let's go in, and be perfectly good hostesses and social lions." Slowly, Samson South came to his feet. His voice was in the dead-level pitch which Wilfred had once before heard. His eyes were as clear and hard as transparent flint. "I'm sorry to be of trouble, George," he said, quietly. "But you must get me to New York at once--by motor. I must take a train South to- night." "No bad news, I hope," suggested Lescott. For an instant, Samson forgot his four years of veneer. The century of prenatal barbarism broke out fiercely. He was seeing things far away-- and forgetting things near by. His eyes blazed and his fingers twitched. "Hell, no!" he exclaimed. "The war's on, and my hands are freed!" For an instant, as no one spoke, he stood breathing heavily, then, wheeling, rushed toward the house as though just across its threshold lay the fight into which lie was aching to hurl himself. The next afternoon, Adrienne and Samson were sitting with a gaily chattering group at the side lines of the tennis courts. "When you go back to the mountains, Samson," Wilfred was suggesting, "we might form a partnership. 'South, Horton and Co., development of coal and timber.' There are millions in it." "Five years ago, I should have met you with a Winchester rifle," laughed the Kentuckian. "Now I shall not."