He had heard enough, and his usual policy came into play.
Amaryllis was able to watch him without exposing herself to the eyes of the enemy; for they had gathered round the injured tray-bearer so near to her side of the hall that the floor of the gallery shut off their view of anything below the top of the arch round whose side she peered, crouching low.
Dick, then, she saw moving snake-wise to the stair; and she marvelled that, even in the hush of the voices below, no slightest sound of his movement reached her ear. Chin first, his head disappeared over the first step, the long body dragging after it, half-inch by half-inch, until all of him that she could see was the thick soles of his boots, clinging, as it appeared, by their toes to the edge of the highest step.
Her heart shook for his danger, which now so closely embraced her own that she forgot its separate significance.
The voices rose again.
"But you're a qualified man yourself," said Melchard. "You'll be responsible."
"Fat lot of good that'll do you," replied Black Beard. "Qualified, by God! When I can't prove it without proving also that I'm off the register, and that my name's not Ockley!" He broke off with an ugly laugh, then added: "Let's go up and see."
And now Amaryllis saw her serpent shoot up to a great rod of vengeance. Before she could ask herself, "What is he going to do?" Dick Bellamy had done it; vaulting, even as he rose, over the rail of the stair, and, with an appalling scream which might have come from a maniac in frenzy, or the mortal agony of a wounded beast, literally falling upon his enemies.
His right foot caught Melchard between jaw and shoulder, shooting him supine and headlong upon the polished floor until his head hit the corner of the stone kerb about the hearth; while the left knee simultaneously struck the cockney, who fell, with Dick's crouching weight full upon him, heavily to the ground; and Amaryllis, fear forgotten, leaning over the rail, heard at the same moment, but as separate sounds, the blow of the under man's head upon the boards and that of Dick's right fist on its left jaw.
Then Dick was on his feet again, but barely in time. For in the clamour and rushing fall of this wild figure, clad in grey flannel trousers and blue shirt, with lank black hair flying stiffly up and away from the savage mouth and blazing blue eyes, Ockley had leapt back out of reach. But the little Spaniard, standing apart, was astonished; his dark eyes showed wide rings of white eyeball, and the open mouth teeth even whiter, as he stared, aghast yet curious, at the living thunderbolt which had fallen so near to him.