The Bittermeads Mystery Read online

  CHAPTER II. THE FIGHT IN THE WOOD

  From his hiding-place in the bushes Dunn slipped out, as the big manvanished into the darkness down the road, and for the fraction of asecond he seemed to hesitate.

  The lights in the house were coming and going after a fashion thatsuggested that the inmates were preparing for bed, and almost at onceDunn turned his back to the building and hurried very quickly and softlydown the road in the direction the big man had just taken.

  "After all," he thought, "the house can't run away, that will be stillthere when I come back, and I ought to find out who this big chap is andwhere he comes from."

  In spite of the apparent clumsiness of his build and the ungainliness ofhis movements it was extraordinary how swiftly and how quietly he moved,a shadow could scarcely have made less sound than this man did as hemelted through the darkness and a swift runner would have difficulty inkeeping pace with him.

  An old labourer going home late bade the big man a friendly good nightand passed on without seeing or hearing Dunn following close behind,and a solitary woman, watching at her cottage door, saw plainly the bigman's tall form and heard his firm and heavy steps and would have beenready to swear no other passed that way at that time, though Dunn wasnot five yards behind, slipping silently and swiftly by in the shelterof the trees lining the road.

  A little further beyond this cottage a path, reached by climbing astile, led from the high road first across an open field and thenthrough the heart of a wood that seemed to be of considerable extent.

  The man Dunn was following crossed this stile and when he had gone ayard or two along the path he halted abruptly, as though all at oncegrown uneasy, and looked behind.

  From where he stood any one following him across the stile must haveshown plainly visible against the sky line, but though he lingered fora moment or two, and even, when he walked on, still looked back veryfrequently, he saw nothing.

  Yet Dunn, when his quarry paused and looked back like this, was only alittle distance behind, and when the other moved on Dunn was still verynear.

  But he had not crossed the stile, for when he came to it he realisedthat in climbing it his form would be plainly visible in outline forsome distance, and so instead, he had found and crawled through a gap inthe hedge not far away.

  They came, Dunn so close and so noiseless behind his quarry he mightwell have seemed the other's shadow, to the outskirts of the wood, andas they entered it Dunn made his first fault, his first failure in anexhibition of woodcraft that a North American Indian or an Australian"black-fellow" might have equalled, but could not have surpassed.

  For he trod heavily on a dry twig that snapped with a very loud, sharpretort, clearly audible for some distance in the quiet night, and, asdry twigs only snap like that under the pressure of considerable weight,the presence of some living creature in the wood other than the smallthings that run to and fro beneath the trees, stood revealed to all earsthat could hear.

  Dunn stood instantly perfectly still, rigid as a statue, listeningintently, and he noted with satisfaction and keen relief that theregular heavy tread of the man in front did not alter or change.

  "Good," he thought to himself. "What luck, he hasn't heard it."

  He moved on again, as silently as before, perhaps a little inclined tobe contemptuous of any one who could fail to notice so plain a warning,and he supposed that the man he was following must be some townsman whoknew nothing at all of the life of the country and was, like so many ofthe dwellers in cities, blind and deaf outside the range of the noisesof the streets and the clamour of passing traffic.

  This thought was still in his mind when all at once the steady sound offootsteps he had been following ceased suddenly and abruptly, cut off onthe instant as you turn off water from a tap.

  Dunn paused, too, supposing that for some reason the other had stoppedfor a moment and would soon walk on again.

  But a minute passed and then another and there was still no sound ofthe footsteps beginning again. A little puzzled, Dunn moved cautiouslyforward.

  He saw nothing, he found nothing, there was no sign at all of the man hehad been following.

  It was as though he had vanished bodily from the face of the earth, andyet how this had happened, or why, or what had become of him, Dunn couldnot imagine, for this spot was, it seemed, in the very heart of thewood, there was no shelter of any sort or kind anywhere near, and thoughthere were trees all round just the ground was fairly open.

  "Well, that's jolly queer," he muttered, for indeed it had a strange anddaunting effect, this sudden disappearance in the midst of the wood ofthe man he had followed so far, and the silence around seemed all themore intense now that those regular and heavy footsteps had ceased.

  "Jolly queer, as queer a thing as ever I came across," he mutteredagain.

  He listened and heard a faint sound from his right. He listened againand thought he heard a rustling on his left, but was not sure and allat once a great figure loomed up gigantic before him and the light oflantern gleamed in his face.

  "Now, my man," a voice said, "you've been following me ever since I leftBittermeads, and I'm going to give you a lesson you won't forget in ahurry."

  Dunn stood quite still. At the moment his chief feeling was one ofintense discomfiture at the way in which he had been outwitted, and heexperienced, too, a very keen and genuine admiration for the woodcraftthe other had shown.

  Evidently, all the time he had known, or at any rate, suspected, thathe was being followed, and choosing this as a favourable spot he hadquietly doubled on his tracks, come up behind his pursuer, and taken himunawares.

  Dunn had not supposed there was a man in England who could have playedsuch a trick on him, but his admiration was roughly disturbed before hecould express it, for the grasp upon his collar tightened and upon hisshoulders there alighted a tremendous, stinging blow, as with all hisvery considerable strength, the big man brought down his walking-stickwith a resounding thwack.

  The sheer surprise of it, the sudden sharp pain, jerked a quick cry fromDunn, who had not been in the least prepared for such an attack, and inthe darkness had not seen the stick rise, and the other laughed grimly.

  "Yes, you scoundrel," he said. "I know very well who you are and whatyou want, and I'm going to thrash you within an inch of your life."

  Again the stick rose in the air, but did not fall, for round about hisbody Dunn laid such a grip as he had never felt before and as would forcertain have crushed in the ribs of a weaker man. The lantern crashed tothe ground, they were in darkness.

  "Ha! Would you?" the man exclaimed, taken by surprise in his turn, and,giant as he was, he felt himself plucked up from the ground as you plucka weed from a lawn and held for a moment in mid-air and then dashed downagain.

  Perhaps not another man alive could have kept his footing under suchtreatment, but, somehow, he managed to, though it needed all his greatstrength to resist the shock.

  He flung away his walking-stick, for he realized very clearly now thatthis was not going to be, as he had anticipated, a mere case of theadministration of a deserved punishment, but rather the starkest,fiercest fight that ever he had known.

  He grappled with his enemy, trying to make the most of his superiorheight and weight, but the long arms twined about him, seemed to pressthe very breath from his body and for all the huge efforts he put forthwith every ounce of his tremendous strength behind them, he could notbreak loose from the no less tremendous grip wherein he was taken.

  Breast to breast they fought, straining, swaying a little this way orthat, but neither yielding an inch. Their muscles stood out like bars ofsteel, their breath came heavily, neither man was conscious any more ofanything save his need to conquer and win and overthrow his enemy.

  The quick passion of hot rage that had come upon Dunn when he felt theother's unexpected blow still burned and flamed intensely, so that heno longer remembered even the strange and high purpose which had broughthim here.

  His adversary, too,
had lost all consciousness of all other things inthe lust of this fierce physical battle, and when he gave presently aloud, half-strangled shout, it was not fear that he uttered or a cryfor aid, but solely for joy in such wild struggle and efforts as he hadnever known before.

  And Dunn spake no word and uttered no sound, but strove all the morewith all the strength of every nerve and muscle he possessed once againto pluck the other up that he might dash him down a second time.

  In quick and heavy gasps came their breaths as they still swayed andstruggled together, and though each exerted to the utmost a strength fewcould have withstood, each found that in the other he seemed to have methis match.

  In vain Dunn tried again to lift his adversary up so that he might hurlhim to the ground. It was an effort, a grip that seemed as though itmight have torn up an oak by the roots, but the other neither budged norflinched beneath it.

  And in vain, in his turn, did he try to bend Dunn backwards to crush himto the earth, it was an effort before which one might have thought thatiron and stone must have given away, but Dunn still sustained it.

  Thus dreadfully they fought, there in the darkness, there in the silenceof the night.

  Dreadfully they wrestled, implacable, fierce, determined, every primevalpassion awake and strong again, and slowly, very slowly, that awful griplaid upon the big man's body began to tell.

  His breathing grew more difficult, his efforts seemed aimed more torelease himself than to overcome his adversary, he gave way an inch ortwo, no more, but still an inch or two of ground.

  There was a sharp sound, like a thin, dry twig snapping beneath acareless foot.

  It was one of his ribs breaking beneath the dreadful and intolerablepressure of Dunn's enormous grip. But neither of the combatants heardor knew, and with one last effort the big man put forth all his vaststrength in a final attempt to bear his enemy down.

  Dunn resisted still, resisted, though the veins stood out like cords onhis brow, though a little trickle of blood crept from the corner of hismouth and though his heart swelled almost to bursting.

  There was a sound of many waters in his ears, the darkness all aroundgrew shot with little flames, he could hear some one breathing verynoisily and he was not sure whether this were himself or his adversarytill he realized that it was both of them. With one sudden, almostsuperhuman effort, he heaved his great adversary up, but had notstrength enough left to do more than let him slip from his grasp to fallon the ground, and with the effort he himself dropped forward on hishands and knees, just as a lantern shone at a distance and a voicecried:

  "This way, Tom. Master John, Master John, where are you?"