“I wouldn’t give much for yer,” he growled, “if yer showed yer face here agen.”
He accompanied this with such a menacing look that I involuntarily shrank away, but recovering myself directly I seized the coil of rope and made for the door.
“What!” roared the great ruffian, snatching the rope, and, as I held on to it, dragging me back. “Trying to steal, are you?”
“It’s mine—it’s ours,” I cried passionately.
“Oh! I’ll soon let yer know about that,” he cried. “Look here, mates; this is our rope, ain’t it?”
“Yes,” said one of them: “I’ll swear to it.”
“It’s mine,” I cried, tugging at it angrily.
“Let go, will yer—d’yer hear; let go.”
He tugged and snatched at it savagely, and just then the boy leaped upon me, butting at me, and striking with all his might, infuriating me so by his cowardly attack, that, holding on to the rope with one hand, I swung round my doubled fist with the other and struck him with all my might.
It must have been a heavy blow right in the face, for he staggered back, caught against a chair, and then fell with a crash, howling dismally.