As he turned his head for a second, he saw Jocelyn holding Shikari with her arms laced round his neck—the dog was growling and licking her face at the same time—but in another minute the drover’s dog came up the slope again, and, with a savage snarl, sprang at his throat.
Throwing out both hands stiffly, he caught at the brute’s neck, but his grip slipped on the short, wiry hair, and the impetus of the dog’s spring carried him backwards on to the ground.
Jocelyn saw his hands slip, saw him stagger, and fall; it seemed impossible to her that he could keep those hideous fangs from his throat. Involuntarily she threw her hands up to her eyes. She had a mental vision of a torn throat—a gaping, jagged wound. A cloud of hot, whirling dust rose from the dry ground, where the man and beast were struggling. For one second of sheer horror she stood still, her face crimson and as suddenly white, then with a little cry she ran towards them; but the struggle was already over. The first movement of her hands had released the greyhound. The drover’s dog had turned with his teeth on Giles’s throat to attack his old enemy, and Giles scrambling to his feet, had seized his stick, dealing the brute a heavy blow, which half stunned him.
Jocelyn saw him leaning over the two dogs, a hand twisted in the collar of each, his face very pale, his figure strained with the effort of holding them apart; his clothes were covered with dust, and he bled from a scratch on one hand. He released the cowed brute, who slunk away down the hill, and stood up, breathing hard, keeping a foot on Shikari, who growled angrily.
Jocelyn went softly up to him. Even now, seeing him erect, she hardly dared look at his throat, so vivid was the memory of the wound that had gleamed, red and angry, before her covered eyes.
She gave a little choke and put out her hands.
When he felt the touch of her fingers on his shoulder he faced her suddenly. In the moments of fierce excitement, when his muscles and his nerves had been strung and braced, all thought of Jocelyn had left him, he had felt only the fighting fever and the consciousness of strength; but his blood was coursing wildly through his veins, and the touch of those fingers was like a spark to a magazine. All his passion returned with tenfold strength.
He faced her with blazing eyes, and his lips quivered.
“Are you hurt, Giles?” she said.
Her eyes were bent on him with a strained look, the black pupils expanding; and her lips were tremulous and parted.