His first impulse was to continue his way and leave them to fight it out.
"It is some wretched, drunken tramp," he said to himself. But a second look showed him that there was too much desperate method on the part of both for this to be the case; and he was looking round for a policeman to interpose the "stern arm of the law," when the struggle was ended as abruptly as it had begun.
The stronger man of the two suddenly flung his antagonist from him with an angry oath, and then disappeared in the fog. He left the other lying almost at Mr. Kingsley's feet—flung there upon his back, with one hand hidden beneath him. He lay motionless as death, silenced by the force with which his head had struck the ground. His white face and closed eyes sent a quick fear to Mr. Kingsley's kindly heart as he bent over him, and he turned to the two porters who hurried up, to say—
"The man's terribly hurt, I'm afraid. There was a quarrel, and he was thrown down."
While one of the men answered him the other stooped down to look at the prostrate figure, and then started to his feet again, crying—
"Mate—it's Gull! It's Gull, I tell you! What does it mean?"
With the help of the policeman, who appeared at this moment, and watched by the usual curious crowd of onlookers, they bathed Gull's face with cold water, forced brandy between his lips, and chafed his cold hands. Then it was that they discovered, tightly clasped in the hand upon which he had been lying, a folded leather case. The policeman unbent the convulsive fingers, and examined this with careful eyes.
"However did Gull get hold of this, I wonder?" was his exclamation.
Mr. Kingsley looked at it with a puzzled expression. It had a strange resemblance to his own pocket-book! Thrusting his hand hurriedly into his various pockets proved to him, without a doubt, that his it was indeed. And a few words were sufficient to convince the policeman of his right to claim it.
But here a sudden movement from Gull turned all eyes towards him once more.