"Go to the window, and call the police," he shouted.

"He's holding me!" Mrs. Fenton cried back pantingly.

Philip strained more desperately, and as he did so he heard the window
within flung open, and the voice of a woman yelling for the police. The
man inside sprang forward with an oath, the door yielded, and Philip
plunged headlong into the room.

As Philip fell upon his knees, he saw a man seize the woman who from
the window was calling for help, and fling her to the floor. The sound
of her fall, with her wild shriek beaten into a choking gasp by the
force with which she struck, turned his heart sick; but his fear for
Mrs. Fenton kept him up. He scrambled to his feet, and as he did so she
ran toward him.

"Your cassock is all dust!" she cried hysterically. "Oh, come away!"

The absurdity of the words made him burst into nervous laughter; yet he
saw that the drunken man was coming, and he instinctively put her
behind him and took some sort of a posture of defense.

"Save yourself," he cried hastily. "He's killed the woman."

All this passed with the quickness of thought. There seemed to Philip
hardly the time of a breath between the opening of the door and the
blow which now fell upon the side of his face. Fortunately he partly
evaded it, but he reeled and staggered, feeling the earth shake and the
air full of stinging points of fire. He saw the figure of his assailant