"What do you want?" he muttered.
Mother Strangeways watched him warily. She worked her arms up and down, as if testing their strength; she measured the distance between them, as if she were bent on reaching him with her bony fist. The glitter in her eyes failed to a cunning softness, while the lines of her mouth grew hard.
"I can't talk loud, lad; bend ower me," she whispered.
He made himself come to the bedside, and stooped to hear what she had to say. In a twinkling her fingers were clawing at his throat. Death-ridden as she was, the old hatred gave the woman a nervous strength of grip. Half-strangled, Griff felt for her hands, and seized them, and forced them down.
"So that's your game, is it?" he laughed. "A pretty specimen of a dying woman you are, Mother Strangeways."
Just that touch of fight had strung up his nerves to their normal pitch.
She lay back on the bed, a little stream of red trickling from her mouth. Griff stood and watched her, not knowing what to say or do, until at last she spoke in a quavering voice.
"It war truth I spoke, Griff Lummax, when I said I war deeing. Another hour—a half-hour, mebbe—'ull see me ready for th' coffin. I tried to kill thee, then, lad, but tha worsted me. Tha'd best be going thy ways, an' leave me to it."
Surely, Griff thought, there was no pretence this time. The pallor on her face, with the bluish tint dusting it here and there, could mean nothing short of death. How could he leave her there to wrestle with the end?
"Mother Strangeways," he said roughly, "I bear you no malice. What's done is done, and you must square the reckoning when you get to the other side. Can I ease the journey for you a bit?"