"Get ready to help him over," cried Mrs. Bindle, terror clutching at her heart.
"Looks to me as if 'Earty and the bull and the whole bloomin' caboodle'll come over together," muttered Bindle.
"Oooooh!"
A new possibility seemed to strike Mrs. Bindle and, with a terrified look at the approaching bull, which at that moment gave utterance to a super-roar, she turned and fled for the gate on the opposite side of the field.
For a second Bindle tore his gaze from the drama before him. He caught sight of several inches of white leg above a pair of elastic-sided boots, out of which dangled black and orange tabs.
"Help, Joseph, help!" Mr. Hearty screamed in his terror and, a second later, he crashed against the gate on which Bindle had climbed ready to haul him over.
Seizing his brother-in-law by the collar and a mercifully slack pair of trousers, he gave him a mighty heave. A moment later, the two fell to the ground; but on the right side of the gate. As they did so, the bull crashed his head against it.
The whole structure shivered. For a moment Bindle gave himself up for lost; but, fortunately, the posts held. The enraged animal could do nothing more than thrust its muzzle between the bars of the gate and snort its fury.
The foaming mouth and evil-looking blood-shot eyes caused Bindle to scramble hastily to his feet.
"Oh God! I am a miserable sinner," wailed Mr. Hearty; "but spare me that I may repent." Then he fell to moaning, whilst Bindle caught a vision of Mrs. Bindle disappearing over the further gate with a startling exposure of white stocking.