One man, no longer young but drunker than the rest, big, red whiskered and burly, reeled up by my side and endeavored to put his arm around me. “Only one kiss, my dear—just one. Now don’t be frisky,” he hiccoughed.
I felt the nauseous hot whisky breath against my cheek. A suppressed scream came from my lips and I started back. Suddenly I saw the right arm of Scott shoot forward. I saw the ruffian dodge and thought Scott had struck at him and missed his mark; but quicker than the flash of thought the tall young man grew a foot taller, the head went back, the chest heaved, the lungs filled, his body seemed to sway to the left and pitch forward, the brawny left fist shot out like a thunderbolt and caught the ruffian square on the angle of the jaw. The man seemed to spring into the air, and as he fell in a heap ten feet away I saw blood gush from his eyes, nose and mouth. The first right hand move of Scott was merely a feint. As the man dodged to the left he ran square against that terrific stroke, which was not a mere hit with the clenched hand, but a stroke backed up by the entire weight of the body. In dodging the blow he had rushed to meet it.
As we passed on, scarcely pausing during the incident I have described, I heard a coarse voice behind say, “He is dead! He got that awful left hander! He’s done for sure! What will his wife say to this?”
Some fell back to look after the man who was hurt and others dropped off or fell behind one by one. I looked in the east and saw the great red streaks which told of the coming of the day. The stars disappeared. I heard the merry song of birds (how the birds do sing early in the morning!) and when we reached the village the sun was just peering over the far off hills. Bilkson, still with his fence rail, marched ahead. The Man and I walked hand in hand, for my woman’s nature had began to assert itself; although at first I felt strong and able to endure anything, but as we entered the village my hand went out to The Man and I felt his reassuring grasp.
This was the first time my hand had touched his, and the only time he had come near me since the first night I saw him, when he passed his hand over my face as I went to sleep.
The mob had disappeared, but a quarter or an eighth of a mile back, I saw coming, jauntily swinging a cane, a high white hat on the back of his head, the Prince Albert coat buttoned around his pompous form, Mr. Pygmalion Woodbur, attorney and counsellor at law. Close behind me still followed Sam Scott, dark and determined.
We entered the little tumbledown depot, and The Man and I sat down on one of the hard benches, Sam Scott seated scowlingly between us. Bilkson and the fencerail thought best to remain outside. Mr. Woodbur entered and smilingly bid me “Good-morning,” stroked the high hat and hoped I was well. He said he heard that I was in trouble; that I had been indiscreet; and knowing my little lapses from the path of rectitude were merely sins of the head and not of the heart, he at once decided to befriend me, and had come out from the city to see that I received right treatment. There I sat, hatless and shoeless, but not friendless, for ever did I feel the serene composure of The Man, and spread out over his bony knee I saw the great brown hand of Sam Scott.
The train was two hours late, and as we sat in the depot children came, curiously peering in the door to see the bad man and woman whom the officers from the city were obliged to arrest. Women came carrying babies in their arms, and rough-whiskered but kindly-hearted men stared at us, and carried on sotto voce conversations which I could partially hear.
“Now ain’t she a wicked-looking thing?” said a woman. “See her long hair clear to her waist—and how brazen!” said another. “Why, if it was me I would cry my eyes out for very shame, and there she sits pale like and not a bit scared.”—“Ah, you Sam Scott, where did you get the introduction?”