"Hullo! You're going the wrong way to get out," he told him.
Egbert Hunt thrust up and filled his lungs as a diver might rise for air. He peered in the direction of Boss Maddox, and went down again. "I know which way I'm going," he said, and squirmed ahead—feeling and thrusting with his outstretched left hand, his right in the pocket of his coat.
Stingo and Maddox met. Each stood high above those about them and each had a cry of challenge for the other as their sticks joined. "Hut!" grunted Stingo and slashed to Boss Maddox's shoulder.
Percival saw the stick caught where it had slipped from its mark and gone into the press; saw Boss Maddox shake himself for freer action and the crowd give way from about him; saw him swing up his arm and poise his stick a dreadful second clear above Stingo's unprotected head—then saw him give an awkward stagger, saw the raised stick slip down between his fingers, heard him grunt and saw him drop down and disappear as a man beneath whose feet the ground had opened.
There arose almost simultaneously, high above the din of sticks and oaths, a scream of shocking sound and horrid meaning—"A knife! A knife!" the scream shot up—"A knife! Some bastard 's used a knife!"
It swept across the struggling men, stopped them, and was cried from throat to throat as though through the night there jarred some evil bird circling with evil cry: "A knife! A knife! Some one's knifed!"
And then again that first voice screamed: "Boss Maddox's knifed! The Boss is murdered!"
And another, most beastly: "Christ! it's pourin' out of 'im. Boss! Boss! 'Oo's done it on yer?"
And a third: "Boss! Boss! God ha' mercy!—he's dead! dead!"
And one that sprung up in panic and smashed a panic blow at the man behind him: "Dead! Dead! Gi' us room, blast yer!"