Come here, you wench!" He caught her arm this time, brutally jerking her toward him, but as instantly staggered backward, grasping at the table, the flash of anger in his eyes changing to a look of startled surprise.

A pistol was leveled full in his face, the polished black barrel shining ominously in the light of the overhead lamp.
"Now perhaps you know what I mean," she said.

"If you dare to touch me I will kill you like a dog.

That is no threat; it is true as God's gospel," and the very tone of her voice carried conviction.

"You say I am a slave--your slave! That may be so, but you will never possess me--never! Life means nothing to me any more, and I never expect to go out of this house alive; I do not even care to.