"I!" It was almost a hair-whitening shock. "I! What? Why? What for?"
"They say you dived before Johnson touched the rope. Nobody believes you did."
So then; I had lost the cup for Bramhall. The lie! Too old to vent suffering in tears, I showed it in a panting chest, a trembling lip, and a dry, wide-eyed stare at my informant. Backed by a disorder outside, he repeated: "Nobody believes you did."
All happiness died out of my ken. Conscious only of aching limbs, a fluttering heart, uneven breath, and a bursting head, I cried:
"I didn't. I didn't. Who said so?"
"Fillet—Carpet Slippers."
"The liar! The liar!" I muttered; and, with a sudden attack of something like cramp down my left side, I fell into a sitting position, and thence into a huddled and fainting heap upon the floor.