Owen scorned to reply to the insinuation of his turning informer, and sat moodily thinking over the event.
“Well, I'll be going, anyhow,” said he rising, for his abhorrence of his companion made him feel the storm and the hurricane a far preferable alternative.
“The divil a one foot ye'll leave this, my boy,” said Miles, grasping him with the grip of his gigantic hand; “no, no, ma bouchai, 'tisn't so easy airned as ye think; a hundred pounds, naboclish!
“Leave me free! let go my arm!” said Owen, whose anger now rose at the insolence of this taunt.
“I'll break it across my knee, first,” said the infuriated ruffian, as he half imitated by a gesture his horrid threat.
There was no comparison in point of bodily strength between them; for although Owen was not half the other's age, and had the advantage of being perfectly sober, the smith was a man of enormous power, and held him, as though he were a child in his grasp.
“So that's what you'd be at, my boy, is it?” said Miles, scoffing; “it's the fine thrade you choose! but maybe it's not so pleasant, after all. Stay still there—be quiet, I say—by——,” and here he uttered a most awful oath—“if you rouse me, I'll paste your brains against that wall;” and as he spoke, he dashed his closed fist against the rude and crumbling masonry, with a force that shook several large stones from their places, and left his knuckles one indistinguishable mass of blood and gore.
“That's brave, anyhow,” said Owen, with a bitter mockery, for his own danger, at the moment, could not repress his contempt for the savage conduct of the other.
Fortunately, the besotted intellect of the smith made him accept the speech in a very different sense, and he said, “There never was the man yet, I wouldn't give him two blows at me, for one at him, and mine to be the last.”
“I often heard of that before,” said Owen, who saw that any attempt to escape by main force was completely out of the question, and that stratagem alone could present a chance.