Mephisto’s whole body seemed to collapse. His fund of resistance was gone. Something white was on the ground. The end of the tail, with its famous, magnificent, glorious, superb, white tuft was no longer attached to Mephisto’s body.
The poodle gave one cry, a dreadful, unearthly, ghostly cry of terror, shame and abandonment, then, his tail between his legs, ran for his very life.
V
Ten minutes later Jeremy, looking out of the schoolroom window, beheld, tottering up the garden, a battered, dishevelled dog. A little trail of blood followed his wavering course.
Hamlet looked up at the window, saw his master, feebly wagged his tail and collapsed.
But as he collapsed he grinned.
CHAPTER VI
THE NIGHT RAIDERS
I
It will be always difficult to understand what drove Jeremy into this adventure. That on the very last night but one of his Christmas holidays, when he had every good reason for placating the powers and when he did, of his own nature, desire that he should leave everything behind him in the odour of sanctity, that at such a time he should take so wild and unnecessary a risk will always and for ever be a deep mystery.
The end of these holidays he especially desired to clothe in tranquillity because of the painful manner in which they had begun. He really did wish to live at peace with his fellow men, and especially with his mother and father. His mother was easy, but his father!