‘Confound her,’ said Blodget, ‘I know what she is doing now. She is piling the furniture against the door, and that was the bedstead. I say!’ Blodget heard a window thrown open, and then a voice calling out,— ‘Help!—help!—thieves!—thieves!—Murder!’ Blodget turned from the door. His eyes fell upon the young girl who was tied to the chair, and in a moment he rushed up to her and untied her head. Then shaking her to and fro, he said— ‘Listen to me. Do you hear me?’ ‘Ye—e—es.’ ‘Go to that door and call to your mistress that I have gone.’ ‘Ye—e—es.’ ‘At once, or I will cut your throat.’ The girl tottered to the door of the inner room, and called out in a loud voice,— ‘Mistress, they have gone now. They have gone now. Open the door. It is only me, Kitty.’ Kitty, in her fright, had done even more than Blodget had asked her. The dread of death had sharpened the wits of the girl, so that she had seen fully what was wanted of her, and she was willing at that moment to think that self-preservation was indeed the very first law of nature, even if it was taken in its most extended signification, and involved the destruction of another. ‘That is right,’ said Blodget, as the girl tapped upon the panel of the door of the inner room, and called to her mistress; ‘call her again, or you die!’ ‘Mistress!’ ‘Who calls?’ ‘It’s me, ma’m!’ ‘Kitty?’ ‘Yes, ma’m!’ ‘How came you free?’ ‘Oh, they have run away, ma’m!’ ‘Open the front window, then, and call out for the police at once, do you hear?’ ‘Yes, ma’m!’ ‘Tell her to open the door,’ said Blodget, ‘or mind your throat.’ ‘Open the door, ma’m!’ ‘No.’ ‘Implore her to do so. Say you are hurt.’ ‘Oh, I am hurt, ma’m! Do open the door.’ ‘Hurt?’ said the lady, ‘You don’t mean that?’ Blodget heard from the voice that she must be just outside the door, or rather, we may say with more precision, just on the other side of it. Full of revengeful thoughts at the idea that she had endangered his safety by her obstinate, and what we would call heroic, resistance to be robbed, he determined on her destruction. Placing a revolver within a couple of inches of the panel of the door, and close to the side of the face of Kitty, although at the moment the girl was too confused to see it, he fired. The report was very stunning. Kitty fell to the floor from fright with a loud scream. ‘Hush!’ said Blodget, as he held up his hands, in an attitude of listening. ‘Hush!’ All was still. A deep groan came from the inner room. ‘Ha! ha!’ cried Blodget. ‘I have hit her!’ It was at that moment that a shrill whistle sounded through the house, and Blodget at once recognized it as the alarm that he had told the man whose duty it was to stay at the outer door of the house to give in case of danger. ‘It is all over,’ said Blodget, ‘and it will be a close touch now as regards escape.’ He made his way to the door of the room, and was out in the corridor in a moment. ‘Ben? Ben?’ ‘Here I am, captain. Oh, Lord!’