It became clearer to Redwood that he must have shot Bensington. He forgot the cuts upon his face, arose and came back to find Bensington seated on the ground and rubbing his shoulder. Bensington looked over his glasses. “We peppered him, Redwood,” he said, and then: “He tried to jump over me, and knocked me down. But I let him have it with both barrels, and my! how it has hurt my shoulder, to be sure.”
A man appeared in the doorway. “I got him once in the chest and once in the side,” he said.
“Where’s the waggons?” said Cossar, appearing amidst a thicket of gigantic canary-creeper leaves.
It became evident, to Redwood’s amazement, first, that no one had been shot, and, secondly, that the trolley and waggon had shifted fifty yards, and were now standing with interlocked wheels amidst the tangled distortions of Skinner’s kitchen garden. The horses had stopped their plunging. Half-way towards them, the burst barrel of sulphur lay in the path with a cloud of sulphur dust above it. He indicated this to Cossar and walked towards it. “Has any one seen that rat?” shouted Cossar, following. “I got him in between the ribs once, and once in the face as he turned on me.”
They were joined by two men, as they worried at the locked wheels.
“I killed that rat,” said one of the men.
“Have they got him?” asked Cossar.
“Jim Bates has found him, beyond the hedge. I got him jest as he came round the corner.... Whack behind the shoulder....”
When things were a little ship-shape again Redwood went and stared at the huge misshapen corpse. The brute lay on its side, with its body slightly bent. Its rodent teeth overhanging its receding lower jaw gave its face a look of colossal feebleness, of weak avidity. It seemed not in the least ferocious or terrible. Its fore-paws reminded him of lank emaciated hands. Except for one neat round hole with a scorched rim on either side of its neck, the creature was absolutely intact. He meditated over this fact for some time. “There must have been two rats,” he said at last, turning away.
“Yes. And the one that everybody hit—got away.”