The moment after they grappled, Silent shifted his
right arm from its crushing grip on Dan’s body
and clutched at the throat. The move was as swift
as lightning, but the parry of the smaller man was
still quicker. His left hand clutched Silent
by the wrist, and that mighty sweep of arm was stopped
in mid-air! They were in the middle of the room.
They stood perfectly erect and close together, embraced.
Their position had a ludicrous resemblance to the
posture of dancers, but their bodies were trembling
with effort. With every ounce of power in his
huge frame Silent strove to complete his grip at the
throat. He felt the right arm of Dan tightening
around him closer, closer, closer! It was not
a bulky arm, but it seemed to be made of linked steel
which was shrinking into him, and promised to crush
his very bones. The strength of this man seemed
to increase. It was limitless. His breath
came struggling under that pressure and the blood thundered
and raged in his temples. If he could only get
at that soft throat!
But his struggling right hand was held in a vice of
iron. Now his numb arm gave way, slowly, inevitably.
He ground his teeth and cursed. His curse was
half a prayer. For answer there was the unearthly
chuckle just below his ear. His hand was moved
back, down, around! He was helpless as a child
in the arms of its father—no, helpless as
a sheep in the constricting coils of a python.
An impulse of frantic horror and shame and fear gave
him redoubled strength for an instant. He tore
himself clear and reeled back. Dan planted two
smashes on Silent’s snarling mouth. A glance
showed the large man the mute, strained faces around
the room. The laughing devil leaped again.
Then all pride slipped like water from the heart of
Jim Silent, and in its place there was only icy fear,
fear not of a man, but of animal power. He caught
up a heavy chair and drove it with all his desperate
strength at Dan.
It cracked distinctly against his head and the weight
of it fairly drove him into the floor. He fell
with a limp thud on the boards. Silent, reeling
and blind, staggered to and fro in the centre of the
room. Morgan and Lee Haines reached Dan at the
same moment and kneeled beside him.
CHAPTER VII
THE MUTE MESSENGER
Almost at once Haines raised a hand and spoke to the
crowd: “He’s all right, boys.
Badly cut across the head and stunned, but he’ll
live.”
There was a deep gash on the upper part of the forehead.
If the cross-bar of the chair had not broken, the
skull might have been injured. The impact of
the blow had stunned him, and it might be many minutes
before his senses returned.
