“I cannot get away. She is holding me, Dad. Help your little feller; help me, I’m so afraid of being burnt.” And looking closer, Mr. Sylvester discerned the outlines of a woman’s head and shoulders above the small white face.
A distinct and positive fear at once seized him. Leaning out, the better to display his own face and figure, he called to that unknown woman to quit her hold and let the child go; but a discordant laugh, rising above the roar of the approaching flames, was his only reply. Sickened with apprehension, he drew back and himself made for the stairs in the wild idea of finding the father. But just then the mad figure of Holt appeared at the door, with frenzy in all his looks.
“I cannot push through the crowd,” cried he, “I have fought and struggled and shrieked, but it is all of no use. My boy is burning alive and I cannot reach him.” A lurid flame shot at that moment from the building before them, as if in emphasis to his words.
“He is prisoned there by a woman,” cried Mr. Sylvester, pointing to the figure whose distorted outlines was every moment becoming more and more visible in the increasing glare. “See, she has him tight in her arms and is pressing him against the windowsill.”
The man with a terrible recoil, looked in the direction of his child, saw the little white face with its wild expression of conscious terror, saw the face of her who towered implacably behind it, and shrieked appalled.
“Jacqueline!” he cried, and put his hands up before his face as if his eyes had fallen upon an avenging spirit.
“Is that Jacqueline Japha?” asked Mr. Sylvester, dragging down the other’s hands and pointing relentlessly towards the ominous figure in the window before him.