Seeing this, villain as he was, I offered him first
chance. I stretched forth my left hand, as I
do to a weaker antagonist, and I let him have the
hug of me. But in this I was too generous; having
forgotten my pistol-wound, and the cracking of one
of my short lower ribs. Carver Doone caught me
round the waist, with such a grip as never yet had
been laid upon me.
I heard my rib go; I grasped his arm, and tore the
muscle out of it* (as the string comes out of an orange);
then I took him by the throat, which is not allowed
in wrestling; but he had snatched at mine; and now
was no time of dalliance. In vain he tugged,
and strained, and writhed, dashed his bleeding fist
into my face, and flung himself on me with gnashing
jaws. Beneath the iron of my strength—for
God that day was with me—I had him helpless
in two minutes, and his fiery eyes lolled out.
* A far more terrible
clutch than this is handed down, to
weaker ages, of the
great John Ridd.—Ed.
“I will not harm thee any more,” I cried,
so far as I could for panting, the work being very
furious: “Carver Doone, thou art beaten:
own it, and thank God for it; and go thy way, and
repent thyself.”
It was all too late. Even if he had yielded in
his ravening frenzy—for his beard was like
a mad dog’s jowl—even if he would
have owned that, for the first time in his life, he
had found his master; it was all too late.
The black bog had him by the feet; the sucking of
the ground drew on him, like the thirsty lips of death.
In our fury, we had heeded neither wet nor dry; nor
thought of earth beneath us. I myself might scarcely
leap, with the last spring of o’er-laboured legs,
from the engulfing grave of slime. He fell back,
with his swarthy breast (from which my gripe had rent
all clothing), like a hummock of bog-oak, standing
out the quagmire; and then he tossed his arms to heaven,
and they were black to the elbow, and the glare of
his eyes was ghastly. I could only gaze and pant;
for my strength was no more than an infant’s,
from the fury and the horror. Scarcely could
I turn away, while, joint by joint, he sank from sight.
[Illustration: 693.jpg Tailpiece]
GIVE AWAY THE GRANDEUR
[Illustration: 694.jpg Illustrated Capital]
When the little boy came back with the bluebells,
which he had managed to find—as children
always do find flowers, when older eyes see none—the
only sign of his father left was a dark brown bubble,
upon a newly formed patch of blackness. But to
the center of its pulpy gorge the greedy slough was
heaving, and sullenly grinding its weltering jaws
among the flags and the sedges.
With pain, and ache, both of mind and body, and shame
at my own fury, I heavily mounted my horse again,
and, looked down at the innocent Ensie. Would
this playful, loving child grow up like his cruel father,
and end a godless life of hatred with a death of violence?
He lifted his noble forehead towards me, as if to
answer, “Nay, I will not”: but the
words he spoke were these:—
