It had become a silent, bitter contest between the two of them, with two
advantages in favor of the girl. She was more intelligent than Herman,
and she knew the thing he was planning to do. She made a careful survey
of her room, and she saw that with a screw-driver she could unfasten the
hinge of her bedroom door. Herman, however, always kept his tools locked
up. She managed, apparently by accident, to break the point off a knife,
and when she went up to her room one afternoon to be locked in while
Herman went to Gus's saloon, she carried the knife in her stocking.
It was a sorry tool, however. Driven by her shaking hand, there was a
time when she almost despaired. And time was flying. The postman, when
he came, came at five, and she heard the kitchen clock strike five
before the first screw fell out into her hand. She got them all out
finally, and the door hung crazily, held only by the padlock. She ran
to the window. The postman was coming along the street, and she hammered
madly at the glass. When he saw her he turned in at the gate, and she
got her letter and ran down the stairs.
She heard his step on the porch outside, and called to him.
"Is that you, Briggs?"
The postman was "Briggs" to the hill.
"Yes."
"If I slide a letter out under the door, will you take it to the
post-office for me? It's important."
"All right. Slide."
She had put it partially under the door when a doubt crept into her
mind. That was not Briggs's voice. She made a frantic effort to draw the
letter back, but stronger fingers than hers had it beyond the door. She
clutched, held tight. Then she heard a chuckle, and found herself with a
corner of the envelope in her hand.
There were voices outside, Briggs's and Rudolph's.
"Guess that's for me."
"Like hell it is."
She ran madly up the stairs again, and tried with shaking fingers to
screw the door-hinges into place again. She fully expected that they
would kill her. She heard Briggs go out, and after a time she heard
Rudolph trying to kick in the house door. Then, when the last screw
was back in place, she heard Herman's heavy step outside, and Rudolph's
voice, high, furious, and insistent.
Had Herman not been obsessed with the thing he was to do, he might have
beaten her to death that night. But he did not. She remained in her
room, without food or water. She had made up her mind to kill herself
with the knife if they came up after her, but the only sounds she heard
were of high voices, growing lower and more sinister.