“You would, you lubber! would you?” he said, and sprang at him.
Now Johnnie was big and fat, but Johnnie was rather drunk, and George was tough and exceedingly strong. In almost less time than it takes to write it he grasped the abominable Johnnie by the scruff of the neck and had with a mighty jerk hauled him over the sofa so that he lay face downwards thereon. By the door quite convenient to his hand stood George’s ground ash stick, a peculiarly good and well-grown one which he had cut himself in Honham wood. He seized it. “Now, boar,” he said, “I’ll teach you how we do the trick where I come from,” and he laid on without mercy. Whack! whack! whack! came the ground ash on Johnnie’s tight clothes. He yelled, swore and struggled in the grip of the sturdy countryman, but it was of no use, the ash came down like fate; never was a Johnnie so bastinadoed before.
“Give it the brute, give it him,” shrilled the fair Edithia, bethinking her of her wrongs, and he did till he was tired.
“Now, Johnnie boar,” he panted at last, “I’m thinking I’ve pretty nigh whacked you to dead. Perhaps you’ll larn to be more careful how you handles your betters by-and-by.” Then seizing his hat he ran down the stairs without seeing anybody and slipping into the street crossed over and listened.
They were at it again. Seeing her enemy prostrate the Tiger had fallen on him, with the fire-irons to judge from the noise.
Just then a policeman hurried up.
“I say, master,” said George, “the folk in that there house with the red pillars do fare to be a murdering of each other.”
The policeman listened to the din and then made for the house. Profiting by his absence George retreated as fast as he could, his melancholy countenance shining with sober satisfaction.
On the following morning, before he returned to Honham, George paid a visit to St. Bartholomew’s Church, Hackney. Here he made certain investigations in the registers, the results of which were not unsatisfactory to him.