Jane fled at the first blow, and the battle began. Maybridge quickly proved the looseness of his great limbs was combined with other gifts proper to a boxer. He smarted doubly; from the other’s insults and from the sense that they were deserved. He had ill-used Richard, and his dislike for him, once loosened, was proportionately bitter.
Stung thus, the young man let his strength and skill have vent. He took and gave some punishment, but he was a disciplined fighter, and very easily kept out the heavy rushes of the keeper. Then, at the first opportunity which Richard offered, Maybridge knocked him squarely off his legs with a tremendous blow over the heart. He rose slowly, but the edge of his strength was gone. His anger nearly blinded him before this reverse, while Anthony, on the other hand, had fought himself into a good humour. Presently at close quarters he hit rather low, and Dick cursed him.
“Fight fair, you devil!” he gasped.
“Fair enough,” puffed the other. “Well up on your small ribs you’ll see the mark in the morning.”
By mutual consent they rested presently; then the battle was renewed, and, knowing himself beaten at every point of the game, Richard Daccombe let his temper loose and fell to fighting like a dog rather than a man. Now it was the other’s turn to cry caution; but the keeper had no ears—he only lusted to do injury. Once Maybridge might have knocked him out of time, but he desisted; then, angered by a brutal kick on the calf of the leg, he got inside Dick’s arms, clenched, gripped the smaller man like a bear, and with a cross buttock hurled him heavily backward. They had fought to the river’s bank, and now, luckily for the looser’s neck, he fell into the water. He struggled to his feet, and stood a moment where moonlight played upon the foaming stream. Then he crawled to the bank, and had scarcely strength to climb it. There he lay panting for some time. Anthony brought him his coat, and offered to give him an arm home; but Dick declined, and getting on to his feet with difficulty, walked along beside his conqueror.
“This is the beginning,” he said—“not the end. If you don’t leave Cross Ways before the week’s out, you never will—not alive.”
“Don’t talk rot like that. I thought you were a good sportsman anyway, but I see you’re not; and that’s the worst you can say against any man. I was going—God’s my judge that I’m telling you the truth—I was going away to-morrow—for a time, at any rate. She wished it. But now—now you threaten me as if you were a murderer, I shan’t move, not an inch. And if there’s any blackguardly attempt on your part to do me an injury, I’ll break your neck, Daccombe; so now you’re warned. Anyway, you have shown that I was right, for any girl would be a madwoman to marry such a lunatic.”
“Talk on, now, if you’ve got the wind to do it,” answered Richard, “but the last word will be mine.”
CHAPTER VI
A black malignity dominated the beaten man after his reverse; and, inasmuch as Jane Stanberry, now at the cross ways of her life, fell from honour and played a base part out of fear, her lover continued to believe that his enemy alone was responsible for Jane’s weakness. He blamed the girl, but his love did not diminish, and he still supposed that Anthony Maybridge once removed, she would return to him with eyes that again saw clearly. He attributed his conqueror’s conduct to a tremendous strength of purpose, whereas mere feebleness and an amorous nature were responsible for it. The woman was at least as guilty as the man; and now an added blame belonged to her, for while Anthony henceforth openly declared himself the rival of Richard, she held the balance a little longer between them—chiefly from fear of Mrs. Daccombe. Her decision was made, yet very carefully she concealed it, and Richard continued in error.