In that moment he thanked God for Brokaw’s slowness.  He had a clear recollection afterward of almost having spoken the words as he lay dazed and helpless for an infinitesimal space of time.  He expected Brokaw to end it there.  But Brokaw stood mopping the blood from his face, as if partly blinded by it, while from beyond the cage there came a swiftly growing rumble of voices.  He heard a scream.  It was the scream—­the agonized cry—­of the Girl, that brought him to his feet while Brokaw was still wiping the hot flow from his dripping jaw.  It was that cry that cleared his brain, that called out to him in its despair that he must win, that all was lost for her as well as for himself if he was vanquished—­for more positively than at any other time during the fight he felt now that defeat would mean death.  It had come to him definitely in the savage outcry of joy when he was down.  There was to be no mercy.  He had read the ominous decree.  And Brokaw....

He was like a madman as he came toward him again.  There was no longer the leer on his face.  There was in his battered and swollen countenance but one emotion.  Blood and hurt could not hide it.  It blazed like fires in his half-closed eyes.  It was the desire to kill.  The passion which quenches itself in the taking of life, and every fibre in David’s brain rose to meet it.  He knew that it was no longer a matter of blows on his part—­it was like the David of old facing Goliath with his bare hands.  Curiously the thought of Goliath came to him in these flashing moments.  Here, too, there must be trickery, something unexpected, a deadly stratagem, and his brain must work out his salvation quickly.  Another two or three minutes and it would be over one way or the other.  He made his decision.  The tricks of his own art were inadequate, but there was still one hope—­one last chance.  It was the so-called “knee-break” of the bush country, a horrible thing, he had thought, when Father Roland had taught it to him.  “Break your opponent’s knees,” the Missioner had said, “and you’ve got him.”  He had never practised it.  But he knew the method, and he remembered the Little Missioner’s words—­“when he’s straight facing you, with all your weight, like a cannon ball!” And suddenly he shot himself out like that, as Brokaw was about to rush upon him—­a hundred and sixty pounds of solid flesh and bone against the joints of Brokaw’s knees!

The shock dazed him.  There was a sharp pain in his left shoulder, and with that shock and pain he was conscious of a terrible cry as Brokaw crashed over him.  He was on his feet when Brokaw was on his knees.  Whether or not they were really broken he could not tell.  With all the strength in his body he sent his right again and again to the bleeding jaw of his enemy.  Brokaw reached up and caught him in his huge arms, but that jaw was there, unprotected, and David battered it as he might have battered a rock with a hammer.  A gasping cry rose out of the giant’s throat, his head sank backward—­and through a red fury, through blood that spattered up into his face, David continued to strike until the arms relaxed about him, and with a choking gurgle of blood in his throat, Brokaw dropped back limply, as if dead.