“Quick!” I gasped desperately. “Get my revolver there on the floor, and use it—but for God's sake keep down; don't let the brute see you.”
She must have heard, but there was no response, although her crying ceased. Yet my own struggle to rid myself of that crushing weight and those iron jaws drowned all other sounds, drove all other thoughts from me. I doubt if what I now record occupied a minute; but God protect me from ever having to experience such another minute! I continued to struggle in desperate hopelessness with single hand, in vain endeavor to wrench loose that awful grip upon my shoulder. Every movement I made was an agony, an inexpressible torture, but the very intensity of pain kept me from faintness, as the maddened beast tore deeper and deeper into the quivering flesh. With knee bent double beneath me I succeeded in turning partially upon one side, lifting the entire weight of the animal as I did so; but no degree of force I could exert would loosen those set jaws. There was no growling, no savage snarling, no sound of any kind,—just that fierce, desperate, silent struggle for life in the darkness. Every muscle of my body began to weaken from the strain, my eyes blurred, faintness swept over me, I felt my brain reeling, when there burst a vivid flash of flame within a foot of my face, singeing my forehead; then followed a deafening report, and the huge brute sprang backward with a snarl of pain, his teeth clicking together like cogs of steel. Then he stiffened and fell prone across me, a dead, inert weight, pinning me breathless to the floor.
For the moment I could do no more than lie there helpless, gasping for breath, scarce conscious even of my deliverance. Then, as sufficient strength returned for action, I rolled the body of the dead brute off me, and lifting myself by aid of the wall against which my head rested, looked about. Two broken chairs overturned upon the floor, and the shapeless, huddled body of my late assailant, alone spoke of the violence of that deadly struggle; but the cabin was yet full of smoke, and I could perceive the figure of the girl leaning against the frame of the open door, the revolver still grasped in her hand. Her posture was that of a frightened deer, as her terror-filled eyes sought the dark interior.
“It is safely over,” I said weakly, for my breath yet came to me in gasps. “The brute is dead.”
“And you are not killed!” Shall I ever forget the glad ring in her voice?—“Oh, thank God! thank God!”
The sound of these eager words yielded me a fresh measure of life.
“Believe me, I certainly do,” I said as cheerfully as possible, “and I thank you also as His instrument; but if you would keep me from fainting away like a nerveless woman, I beg you come here.”
I could mark her coming across the narrow streak of moonlight, moving toward me as a frightened bird might, startled at everything, and passing as far from the lifeless mass on the floor as the small space would allow. As she bent anxiously over me her face was so in shadow that I could distinguish nothing of its features.
“What is it? Are you indeed severely hurt?”
“Not seriously, I think, yet I have lost some blood, and am in great pain. There is brandy in the inner pocket of my jacket, but I am unable to move my arm in order to reach it. Would you endeavor to draw the flask out?”