“There is no one to help. They could not come if they would. You would be wiser to turn to your own souls that ye be not cast to the burning. Lo, strand by strand the cable snaps which holds you. There is yet another, and with each that goes there is more strain upon the rest. Five minutes of time, and all eternity beyond.” A moan of fear rose from the prisoners in the lift. Stangate felt a cold sweat upon his brow as he passed his arm round the shrinking girl. If this vindictive devil could only be coaxed away for an instant he would spring across and take his chance in a hand-to-hand fight. “Look here, my friend! We give you best!” he cried. “We can do nothing. Go up and cut the cable if you wish. Go on--do it now, and get it over!” “That you may come across unharmed. Having set my hand to the work, I will not draw back from it.” Fury seized the young officer. “You devil!” he cried. “What do you stand there grinning for? I’ll give you something to grin about. Give me a stick, one of you.” The man waved his hammer. “Come, then! Come to judgment!” he howled. “He’ll murder you, Tom! Oh, for God’s sake, don’t! If we must die, let us die together.” “I wouldn’t try it, sir,” cried Billy. “He’ll strike you down before you get a footing. Hold up, Dolly, my dear! Faintin’ won’t ’elp us. You speak to him, miss. Maybe he’ll listen to you.” “Why should you wish to hurt us?” said Mary. “What have we ever done to you? Surely you will be sorry afterwards if we are injured. Now do be kind and reasonable and help us to get back to the ground.” For a moment there may have been some softening in the man’s fierce eyes as he looked at the sweet face which was upturned to him. Then his features set once more into their grim lines of malice. “My hand is set to the work, woman. It is not for the servant to look back from his task.” “But why should this be your task?” “Because there is a voice within me which tells me so. In the night-time I have heard it, and in the daytime too, when I have lain out alone upon the girders and seen the wicked dotting the streets beneath me, each busy on his own evil intent. ‘John Barnes, John Barnes,’ said the voice. ‘You are here that you may give a sign to a sinful generation--such a sign as shall show them that the Lord liveth and that there is a judgment upon sin.’ Who am I that I should disobey the voice of the Lord?” “The voice of the devil,” said Stangate. “What is the sin of this lady, or of these others, that you should seek their lives?” “You are as the others, neither better nor worse. All day they pass me, load by load, with foolish cries and empty songs and vain babble of voices. Their thoughts are set upon the things of the flesh. Too long have I stood aside and watched and refused to testify. But now the day of wrath is come and the sacrifice is ready. Think not that a woman’s tongue can turn me from my task.” “It is useless!” Mary cried. “Useless! I read death in his eyes.”