towards him. “Simpleton,” he shouted, as he wrenched the weapon from her clutch. “It’s very plain you never did fire a pistol before, or you wouldn’t try to pull the trigger with the hammer down.”
Helen Boyne tossed her head with dismay when she saw how easily she had been defeated, and her flesh crept as the man seized her by the arm, and dragged her back to the seat which she had left but a few minutes before. When he had resumed his place opposite to her, he said calmly, as he scanned the revolver that he held in his hand,
“You see, Miss, this is what you should have done; you should have drawn the trigger back thus, making it click twice, do you hear? And then having satisfied yourself that the percussion cap on the nipple was all right, if you had held it out towards me as I do to you now” (and he brought the muzzle within a few inches of her face as he said so), “why then the least pressure of the finger would be sufficient to lay a person’s body lifeless in an instant at the feet. Do you see, simple one?” and the girl cowered her head as far back as she could, while the fellow patted her under the chin as he said: “Come, Miss Hasty, will you trim my locks for me, now?”
CHAPTER III. A STRANGE ADVENTURE.
Helen Boyne was, as we have before said, a strange, contradictory instance of the combination of the two opposite qualities: an utter want of nerve on certain occasions, and a marvellous strength of nerve upon others; for silly little coward as she was at one time, she could still play the heroine even to the extravagance of melodramatic action at another. What wonder then that the damsel with eyes as full of fire as those of a blood-horse, should at one moment be levelling a pistol at a ruffian’s head, and threatening to shoot him down if he moved a step towards her—as though she were some Amazonic young lady in a penny romance of thrilling interest—and the next minute be crouching with the acutest fear, like a well-beaten spaniel at the feet of its master. Even the strongest minded of men can hardly bear to look steadily down the barrel of a loaded gun presented at their forehead; so it was but natural that poor Helen should have averted her head, and shrunk away as far as she could from the ring of ugly black holes that formed the end of the revolver held within a few inches of her face.
“Now, girl,” cried the fellow, “take the scissors and clip away. It’s no use shivering there like an Italian greyhound. Do the work quickly, and you have nothing to fear; but hesitate, or attempt to raise the least alarm, and I can tell you I am too desperate a man to make any bones about taking your life. There, lay hold of the scissors, I say, and get the job over as quickly as possible;” and so saying, he thrust the scissors into her hand.
“Oh, sir!” faltered out the girl, “why not wait till we get to Cassel, and then I will willingly pay the money out of my own pocket to have it done. I should only wound you in the terrible tremble that I am in now.”
“Bah! I shall have no time to spare there. Besides, it is my whim that you, and you alone, shall be my hair-dresser,” returned her opposite neighbour wildly. “Directly I looked at myself in the glass, I made up my mind to have it all off; and when I saw your black eyes staring at me from the corner, like a rat peeping out of its dark hole, I was determined you should have the shearing of the sheep; so come, to your work, for there is no time to lose. Do it quickly, I say again, and you are safe against injury from me.”
The girl felt that she was in the power of a sturdy maniac, and knew that it was as much as her life was worth to refuse to carry out his mad whim; so she merely ejaculated, with a deep, hysterical sigh, “But pray take that ugly pistol away, sir, and then I will try what I can do.” And when the man had lowered the hand in which he held the weapon, and thrust his grisly chin forward towards her, the girl shuddered from head to foot when she laid hold of the end of the ugly red beard. As she raised the scissors in her hand, her first thought was, “What if I stab the wretch in the throat with them?” But she paused for a moment in the frenzy of the thought, and the cunning ruffian, half guessing what was passing through the girl’s mind, raised the hateful pistol once more,—a movement so significant, that it quickly caused her to cast aside all ideas of vengeance. The next minute the locks began to fall thick and fast into her lap, and as they did so she shook them from her dress with her knees, as if they were a knot of adders clinging to her.
“Good! good!” shouted the fellow. “Cut it close off—down to the roots, girl—whiskers, moustachios, and all. Make me as bare as a clipped poodle.”
“There!” cried the girl, after a time, “thank Heaven it’s over now—and I haven’t wounded you either.”
“Ay, you have done it well enough so far as it goes; but come, your task isn’t half finished yet,” said her ruffianly companion.
“Augh!” groaned Helen. “What else am I to be forced to do?”
“Here, all these locks must away as well,” and with the words, the man lifted up a large bunch of the yellow mop of hair that dangled about his shoulders; so putting his head down nearly into her lap, he waited for her to continue the operation.
The girl had now so far overcome the loathing which she had felt at the commencement of her arduous task, and was so far satisfied that if she complied with his lunatic freak he would remain quiet, that she began to ply the scissors again as rapidly as she could, so as to have done with the filthy work as fast as possible; and it was not very long before she had shorn the wretch’s head as close as a convict’s.
“Ah, that’s capital!” he ejaculated hurriedly, as he rubbed his hand over his bare round skull that was now not unlike a huge skittle-ball, and then drawing once more the little mirror from the carpet-bag in the netting above, he began to gaze at himself again in the looking-glass. “Thunder