"God help me, I won't go!" he gritted, the words carrying on his thought. With one sweep of his arms, he encircled Tess in a close embrace. She made frantic efforts to free herself, but Frederick, strong under the emotion consuming him, only hugged her closer. "Let me go!" Tess almost screamed the words. Then, her voice changed to a tense whisper, hoarse with loathing. "How can ... oh, how dare you!" But she could not protect her face from the searching mouth. Violently, Frederick twisted her around and for one moment his lips fell upon hers. Deep groans came between the kisses he thrust upon her. A moment later the sound of advancing steps lifted Frederick's face from hers. Muttering an oath, he threw Tess forcibly from him, for there in the path was Ebenezer Waldstricker, about whose sagging lips played a supercilious smile. "So I was not mistaken," he sneered, looking his brother-in-law full in the face. "If Madelene doesn't care, I do." "Well?" growled Frederick. "You've found me here, now do what you cursed want to, I don't care." "Perhaps you'll care before I finish," said the elder grimly, and he included the girl in his baleful glare. "I think you both will." Tessibel's mind flew to Boy. What could these two men do to her darling? She went forward toward Waldstricker, her eyes raised appealingly to his. "Won't you make Mr.... Mr. Graves keep away?" she petitioned. "I don't want him here." "Yes, it looked, when I came around the corner, as if you didn't want him, miss," scoffed the elder. Then he laughed, and the laugh cut the throbbing girl to the quick. "Very much as if you wanted him to go.... Now, then, sir, what's this girl to you?" "I'm nothing to him, Mr. Waldstricker," she asserted, without giving Frederick a chance to speak. Graves still felt that maddening passion, that demand for his own. "She lies," he said in low tones. Tess turned to him passionately. "You know what I say is true. You came here without my desiring it! I don't want anything to do with you.... Haven't you both harmed me enough?... Do I ever come around and hurt you?... Why don't you tell the truth?" "All right," he shouted, his irritation at her resistance overcoming his fear of the elder. "If you want the truth, here it is. I'm----" "Don't! Don't!" screamed Tess. "Ah!" hissed Waldstricker's lips like a jet of steam. He'd caught within his powerful net the girl he wanted. He'd bring to light the secret that'd preyed upon his sister's spirits so long. For the squatter girl he felt no pity, for Frederick only contempt. They were both weaklings that he'd sweep away in his pursuit of Young and the squatters. "He's sick," said Tessibel, trying to discount Frederick's confession. "Your brother-in-law's sick. You can see that!... He thinks ... why, he's mad!" "I'm not mad!" Frederick turned upon her fiercely, then back to the big man whose eagerness bent him forward. "I'm the father of her boy."