I had my arms round him like steel bands. Once he might have been my match, or better, but not now in his state of physical degeneration.
“Yes, end it,” he whispered. “I always thought to die by water as she did. The chase here is exhausting me. I can finish my task more effectively from the other side the grave.”
I gave a mocking laugh.
“You shall purge your hate in fire, there,” I said. “Ghostly revenge on the living is an old wives’ tale.”
He struggled to force an arm free and pointed down at the foaming mill-tail.
“There’s a voice there,” he cried, “that says otherwise. I read it, and so do you, for all your shaking heroics. Fling me down! I escape the self-destruction that was to come. Fling me down and end it!”
I tightened my arms about him. The first desperate fury of my mood was leading me and with it the impulse to murder. The wan, once-dear features were appealing to me against their will and mine.
Suddenly, while I wavered, an appalling screech burst from him; he wrenched himself free of me with one mad superhuman effort, struck out at the empty air, and turned and fled across the bridge and up toward the hill beyond. In a moment he was lost to sight in the darkness.
In the shock of his escape I twisted about to see what had so moved him—and, not a yard behind me, was standing Dr. Crackenthorpe.
For many seconds we stared at one another speechless and motionless. His face was pale and set very grimly.