His Other Wife: A Novel — page 290: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

282 A VULTURE ON GUARD. to the utterance of false vows, or choosing to die; but you have only to insist upon the demand you have just made, and you will see how quickly I shall decide.” He instantly divined that her words were backed by her consciousness of the ability to defend herself against him, if need be. It was not in his thought to harm her fair, angelic womanhood other than by wringing from her now the promise which, once made, he felt she would keep at every cost. he soft, exquisite purity of her nature and character had already lifted him above the coarse brutality that could offer, or even meditate, insult to a creature so divinely fair and true. In uttering the last word, Faith drew forth the keen, delicate blade, that flashed like a moonbeam under the lamp, and held it firmly clasped. The fear that she might do herself some dangerous*in- jury now so superseded every other idea in Valasco’s brain that, under a thoughtless impulse, he laid hold of the hand that held the naked dagger, intending simply to dis- arm the girl, | Scarce had his fingers closed upon her snowy wrist when a pair of talon-like hands, more like a vulture’s claws than fingers of a human creature, griped round his throat, and bore him to the floor. For one dread moment there was no sound nor motion after the falling of the captain’s ponderous frame; but, in the dimness and the smoky atmosphere, two forms were comicbooks.co