第35章

Then it was that the two others sprang upon me.I saw them coming, and got an arm round the waist of each, and down we all fell upon the floor of the cave together, rolling over and over.They were strong men, but I was mad with rage, and that awful lust for slaughter which will creep into the hearts of the most civilized of us when blows are flying, and life and death tremble on the turn.My arms were round the two swarthy demons, and I hugged them till I heard their ribs crack and crunch up beneath my grip.They twisted and writhed like snakes, and clawed and battered at me with their fists, but I held on.Lying on my back there, so that their bodies might protect me from spear thrusts from above, I slowly crushed the life out of them, and as I did so, strange as it may seem, I thought of what the amiable head of my college at Cambridge (who is a member of the Peace Society) and my brother fellows would say if by clairvoyance they could see me, of all men, playing such a bloody game.

Soon my assailants grew faint, and almost ceased to struggle, their breath had failed them, and they were dying, but still I dared not leave them, for they died very slowly.I knew that if I relaxed my grip they would revive.The other ruffians probably thoughtfor we were all three lying in the shadow of the ledgethat we were all dead together, at any rate they did not interfere with our little tragedy.

I turned my head, and as I lay gasping in the throes of that awful struggle I could see that Leo was off the rock now, for the lamplight fell full upon him.He was still on his feet, but in the centre of a surging mass of struggling men, who were striving to pull him down as wolves pull down a stag.Up above them towered his beautiful pale face crowned with its bright curls (for Leo is six feet two high), and I saw that he was fighting with a desperate abandonment and energy that was at once splendid and hideous to behold.He drove his knife through one manthey were so close to him and mixed up with him that they could not get at him to kill him with their big spears, and they had no knives or sticks.The man fell, and then somehow the knife was wrenched from his hand, leaving him defenceless, and I thought the end had come.But no;with a desperate effort he broke loose from them, seized the body of the man he had just slain, and lifting it high in the air hurled it right at the mob of his assailants, so that the shock and weight of it swept some five or six of them to the earth.But in a minute they were all up again, except one, whose skull was smashed, and had once more fastened upon him.And then slowly, and with infinite labor and struggling, the wolves bore the lion down.Once even then he recovered himself, and felled an Amahagger with his fist, but it was more than man could do to hold his own for long against so many, and at last he came crashing down upon the rock floor, falling as an oak falls, and bearing with him to the earth all those who clung about him.They gripped him by his arms and legs, and then cleared off his body.

"A spear," cried a voice; "a spear to cut his throat, and a vessel to catch his blood."I shut my eyes, for I saw the man coming with a spear, and myself, I could not stir to Leo's help, for I was growing weak, and the two men on me were not yet dead, and a deadly sickness overcame me.

Then suddenly there was a disturbance, and involuntarily I opened my eyes again, and looked towards the scene of murder.The girl Ustane had thrown herself on Leo's prostrate form, covering his body with her body, and fastening her arms about his neck.They tried to drag her from him, but she twisted her legs round his, and hung on like a bulldog, or rather like a creeper to a tree, and they could not.

Then they tried to stab him in the side without hurting her, but somehow she shielded him, and he was only wounded.

At last they lost patience.

"Drive the spear through the man and the woman together," said a voice, the same voice that had asked the questions at that ghastly feast, "so of a verity shall they be wed."Then I saw the man with the weapon straighten himself for the effort.I saw the cold steel gleam on high, and once more I shut my eyes.

As I did so I heard the voice of a man thunder out in tones that rang and echoed down the rocky ways" _i_ Cease! _i_ "

Then I fainted, and as I did so it flashed through my darkening mind that I was passing down into the last oblivion of death.