At last Oda Yorimoto reached the far side of the long
chamber.
"Here!" he said, and took her by the shoulders.
"Here!" answered the girl in a low, tense voice, and at the
instant that she spoke Oda Yorimoto, Lord of Yoka, felt a
quick tug at his belt, and before he guessed what was to
happen his own short sword had pierced his breast.
A single shriek broke from the lips of the daimio; but it
was so high and shrill and like the shriek of a woman in
mortal terror that the woman in the next room who heard it
but smiled a crooked, wicked smile of hate and turned once
more upon her pallet to sleep.
Again and again Barbara Harding plunged the sword of
the brown man into the still heart, until she knew beyond
peradventure of a doubt that her enemy was forevermore
powerless to injure her. Then she sank, exhausted and trembling,
upon the dirt floor beside the corpse.
When Theriere came to the realization that Barbara Harding
was gone he jumped to the natural conclusion that Ward
and Simms had discovered the ruse that he had worked upon
them just in time to permit them to intercept Miller and
Swenson with the girl, and carry her back to the main camp.
The others were prone to agree with him, though the
mucker grumbled that "it listened fishy.
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