“Don't, I tell you, don't!” cried John, and he moved away.
They followed and began to push him. Then he stopped and cried in a loud voice of struggle and agony: “Do you want to raise the devil in me? Go home! Go home!”
But they only laughed and renewed their torment. His hat fell off and he snatched at it to recover it. In doing so his hand struck somebody in the face. “Strike a cripple, will ye?” said the publican, and he raised his stick and struck a heavy blow on John's shoulder. At the next moment the dog had leaped upon the man, and he was shrieking on the ground. The “knocker-up” lifted his crutch and with the upper end of it he battered at the dog's brains.
“Stop, man! stop, stop!—Don! Don!”
But the dog held on, and the man with the crutch continued to strike at it, until Pincher, who had run to the other side of the street, came back with a clasp knife and plunged it into the dog's neck. Then with a growl and a whine and a pitiful cry the creature let go its hold and rolled over, and the publican got on to his feet.
It was the beginning of the end. John Storm looked down at the dog in its death-throes, and all the devil in his heart came up and mastered him. There was a shop at the corner of the square, and some heavy chairs were standing on the pavement. He took up one of these and swung it round him like a toy, and the men fell on every side.
By this time the street was in commotion, and people were coming from every court and yard and alley crying:
“A madman!” “Police!” “Lay hold of him!” “He'll kill somebody!” “Down with him!”
John Storm was also shouting at the top of his voice, when suddenly he felt a dull, stunning pain, without exactly knowing where. Then he felt himself moving up, up, up—he was in a train, the train was going through a tunnel, and the guards were screaming; then it was hot and at the next moment it was cold, and still he was floating, floating; and then he saw Glory—he heard her say something—and then he opened his eyes, and lo! the dark sky was above him, and some women were speaking in agitated voices over his face.
“Who is it?”