In the confused darkness of her blindness the girl was stammering something. Toory did not hear it. His swinging, heavy hand reached down and she recoiled from it, as if terrified by his inhuman strength. In his awkwardness he reached out again, and she gave a little cry, and wilted down at his feet.
He said, "Miss Babs, I am sorry. I did not mean to frighten you. I will carry you home now."
It was as though a floodgate had broken, releasing in Toory an enormous surge of shining confidence. Higgins had backed further down the path, and Toory's eye-beams swung to his pallid, panic-stricken face.
"You keep away from me!" Higgins gasped.
"No," Toory said.
"You got to take orders from me! Do you hear?"
Toory moved from the fallen Babs, and started remorselessly toward Higgins. In wild panic Higgins stooped, picked up a stone and sent it clanking against the glistening plate of Toory's chest. Toory continued to advance, his hands extended with the work-pincers out.
For just an instant, like a terror-stricken animal with its foot in a trap, Higgins stood shaking. Then he turned and fled down the path. To no avail. With monstrous clanking bounds Toory was on him as he reached the garden gate.
It was all a strange and terrible confusion to Toory. Dominating him was the thought that he must carry Miss Babs back in safety, just as if she had been hit by an autocar and needed instant care.