Paul Brent gave one look through the unglazed window, dropped his bundle
on the path and made for the door. Half a minute ago he had been walking
slowly up the Rue de Rosières with that camel’s hump of a bundle on his
back, feeling fagged and ready for a rest, but there was no tiredness
about the man who went in to rescue his mate.
When Brent stormed in, overturning the chair that had stood against the
door, he found Bibi waiting for him like a bear with its paws ready to
rip. The overturned chair lay between them, its legs in the air as
though it were shouting a ridiculous protest and trying to keep these
two wild men apart. Manon had slipped away and was leaning against the
dresser, her dress torn open at the throat, her eyes swimming black in a
dead white face.
Brent and Bibi looked at each other. There was nothing to be said,
nothing that words could express or satisfy. Then Bibi pushed the chair
aside with a sweep of a big foot, and the two men rushed in.
Bibi could box a little, but there was no science in that fight; it was
just a savage rough and tumble. The Frenchman was a head taller than
Paul, heavier, and longer in the arms. He could have floored Brent at
the first punch had the affair been less of a whirlwind. Paul went in
bull-headed, smothered a smash at his face, and ducking, got his arms
round Bibi’s body. He had the under-grip and was shorter and stockier
than the Frenchman, and he rushed Bibi against the table, heaved him
over and got on top.
Freeing his right hand, he tried for Louis Blanc’s throat, but in mere
animal strength he was no match for this great stallion who had always
boasted that he had the legs of a horse. Bibi gripped Paul round the
middle. His legs wrapped themselves round Brent’s; he heaved, twisted,
rolled Paul on his side. They remained like that for a moment, Bibi
jerking his lean throat away from the grip of Paul’s right hand. Then
Bibi gave another twist. He came up and had Brent under him, his jaw
digging into Paul’s throat, and so close that his own throat was
guarded.
“Voilà!”
Manon saw the smear of satisfaction on his face, and her heart sickened.
She had stood aside, watching, till she saw that Bibi had her man pinned
under his big body. She picked up a knife from the dresser and came
forward.
“Let go.”
Bibi glanced up, showing his teeth, and that momentary slackening of his
attention gave Brent a chance. He got one foot round the leg of the
table, and managed to roll Bibi to one side. They had been near the edge
of the table and they fell, Brent uppermost, Bibi’s head striking the
tiled floor.
Brent broke free and stood up, panting. He saw that he would have to
keep the fighting open, the beast was too strong for him at close
quarters. He jerked a glance at Manon.
“Run, get out of the room.”
She tried to force the knife on him, but Brent’s rage would have none of
it. He was not ripe yet for a clutch at any sort of weapon. Bibi, still
giddy, was scrambling up, his mouth and chin all slaver. Brent rushed at
him, and struck hard and straight with a workman’s arm and fist, and
Bibi went back, knees sagging, his feet paddling like the feet of a
duck. Brent swung again, missed, fell against the Frenchman and was
shoved back with the flat of the hand in his face. Brent staggered
against the table, hung there a moment, and went in again like a game
dog that has been rolled over but not hurt. But Bibi had recovered his
balance and had had a second in which to think. As Brent came at him he
lashed out with his right foot, a full, swinging, upward kick that
caught Paul in the stomach.
Brent’s face went the colour of clay. His mouth gaped. The kick had sent
him reeling down the room. He seemed to bend over himself, to double up
in the middle. He fell in the corner, turned over, writhing, and lay
face downwards, legs quivering. He was conscious of nothing but a knot
of agony in his stomach, a vast nausea, a desire to vomit.
Bibi stood and stared. His shoulders drooped a little, and his head was
none too steady, but he appeared to perk up into sudden arrogance like a
big, triumphant bird. He flapped his arms, opened his mouth, and the
laugh that came from it was like a crow.
“That’s burst the balloon,” he said.
Then he became conscious of Manon. She was standing between him and
Brent, but a little to one side, her face white and stiff with a vague,
shocked wonder. She seemed to hesitate, her impulse stooping towards the
man who now lay huddled in the corner.
Suddenly she turned on Bibi. Her lips were thin, bloodless; she looked
starved, but in her eyes there was something indescribable, a facing of
the ultimate vileness of Bibi’s strength, a defiance of physical defeat.
“Yes, and what next?”
Bibi seemed to rear on his haunches, his hands stuck in his pockets.
“Your fellow is thrashed. He is no good, is he? I can take what I want,
my dear. What do you say?”
She hung her head as though beaten, her wits struggling against a sense
of helplessness.
“And all this happens, because a silly ruin is blown down by the wind.”
“You got in my way, both of you.”
“We were here, that’s all. Haven’t you any decent feeling?”
Bibi looked at her with flat eyes that gloated. The physical rage was
still strong in him, and he was taking his triumph.
“You wouldn’t have me. You shan’t have him. I can finish with him
presently, and then I’ll finish with you.”
“There are the gendarmes,” she said.
Bibi splurged.
“Rubbish! We’re in the wilderness, wild man’s land. I can do what I
please. That fellow got in my way, and I have kicked his belly in. Who’s
to know if——”
She shuddered. She was looking at Paul, and suddenly she saw his hand
move as though making a sign. Her eyes swept back to Bibi; he was
watching her; he had not seen.
“You have beaten him; is that not enough?”
“If I get what I want for it.”
“Be reasonable.”
“Drop that knife,” he said; “you have still got it behind your back.”
She let it fall on the floor. She wanted to keep Bibi talking to hold
him off.
And Brent lay there, listening. His strength was coming back; he had
been sick, and the pain had died to an ache of the muscles. His rage was
returning, a cold rage that lay low and was cunning. He was up against
savagery, a beast who had to be fought with the methods of a beast.
Right down in the core of his brain was the thought that he had got to
beat Bibi, even if he killed him. That kick had brought Brent down into
the primitive trough; there were no rules, no nicenesses, no points of
honour in a savage scramble with a man like Louis Blanc.
He listened. Manon was talking, talking for time. He loved Manon, and
his love was a rage.
“Paul is dying,” he heard her say.
Bibi shrugged.
“He’s quiet, anyway.”
Brent moved slightly, groaned; but his body was stiffening like a
spring. If only he had some weapon! His right hand went out slowly,
gropingly, into the corner, and touched something smooth and cold. It
was an empty wine-bottle, the bottle that he, Manon, and old Durand had
emptied a few days ago. He gripped the neck of it, braced himself, his
left arm pressed against the wall.
He was on his feet before Bibi moved. A wooden chair stood against the
wall close to where Brent had been lying, and as the Frenchman rushed
in, Paul grabbed the chair and swung it at Bibi’s feet. It tripped him,
nearly brought him down, and as he hung there, pawing the air to get his
balance, Brent smashed at his head with the empty bottle. It broke,
leaving the neck a jagged end in Paul’s hand.
Bibi was down over the chair. He made a grab at Brent and caught the
front of his coat; his face was upturned and Paul struck at it with that
dagger of glass. He saw Bibi’s face change like a grotesque mask; the
mouth opened, the eyes closed, the forehead was a knot of anguish. He
uttered a cry, and began to claw at Brent like a beast gone mad. Paul
struck him again, and wrenched free, leaving a piece of his coat in one
of Bibi’s paws.
Bibi was on his feet now, his face a red stream. He groped, made a rush,
and stumbled over the chair, and Brent realized that the man was blind.
The glass had entered one eye, and the other was full of blood.
He slipped round the centre table, with a glance at Manon who had run to
the door; he made a sign to her, a sign that she understood.
Bibi mopped his eyes with his fists. The hideousness of him was a thing
Brent never forgot. And the beast was dangerous, agonized with pain and
the rage of its half blindness. He blundered against the dresser, and
brought half the crockery clattering to the floor. And suddenly he
seemed to get a glimpse of Brent through the red fog of his own blood,
and he charged, arms swinging. Paul slewed the table round, but Bibi
lunged forward over it, and got a grip of Brent’s coat.
Paul tore free, striking at Bibi’s arm. He had to keep away from those
ferocious and clawing hands, and he knew it, but Bibi was blind again,
and raising himself up from his sprawling position on the table.
“Paul——”
Manon had come back, and she carried the short iron crow-bar in her hand
that Brent had used in dismantling the huts.
“Keep out,” he said hoarsely, “it’s too foul, this.”
She went, after giving him that bar of iron.
Bibi was shaking his head like a dog just out of the water. His foot
touched something on the floor—the knife that Manon had dropped; he
groped for it, and stood up. He had begun to curse, calling Brent every
foul thing under the sun, and he kept on cursing as he felt his way
forward. There was cunning in Bibi. He fumbled at the table, seeing Paul
dimly through a red mist, and suddenly he vaulted on to the table and
made a scrambling rush at Brent.
Brent swung at the upraised arm. The bar caught the forearm bones about
two inches above the wrist, and he heard them crack. The knife fell;
Bibi’s hand sagged over like the absurd stuffed hand of a dummy. But
Brent’s gorge was rising over this filthy scramble, this savagery of
animals in a cage. He steadied himself, brought the bar down over Bibi’s
head, and saw him crumple to the floor.
Brent stood, staring. He felt sick, unsteady, a man who had got up to
the neck in some foul ditch. There was no exultation in him, yet no
pity. He had downed a mad beast, and he was grim and cautious.
He bent down and pulled Bibi against the wall. He did not think there
was any more fight in Louis Blanc, but he took no risks. Up-ending the
table, he lowered one end of it on to Bibi’s legs, and loaded the
arm-chair on to the table. That would prevent a man who was playing
’possum from getting up too quickly.
“It’s all over, thank God.”
She came in to him, an impetuous passionate figure, arms spread, eyes
alight.
“Oh, my Paul!”
Her emotion was like a flood of rain, a perfume, some softening human
passion after those moments of savagery and bloody sweat. She ran to
Brent and Paul caught her. Her head was on his shoulder; she trembled;
she clutched him with tender hands; her body seemed to warm itself
against his.
“Oh, my Paul, we are saved!”
“Ma chérie.”
Then she broke down, and with a passion that went to Paul’s heart. He
was human once more, a decent, gentle fellow; the beast was dead; her
tears seemed to cleanse him.
“It was my fault, my foolishness. I left the pistol lying by the window,
and he must have been watching. He threw it across the street into the
ruins. It need never have happened.”
Brent held her head in the hollow of one hand, and looked down into her
wet face.
“Well, it has happened. Perhaps it was better that it should happen,
once and for all.”
“Is he dead?”
Paul glanced over one shoulder at Bibi, and his eyes hardened.
“No, but he has all he can carry, one eye gone, and a broken wrist.”
Manon was feeling in the pocket of her apron, and she showed Paul the
pistol that Bibi had thrown into the ruins. “I ran across a moment ago,
and I had good luck. I found it almost at once. Keep it.” Brent slipped
the pistol into his pocket, and discovered that Manon’s face seemed
growing dim. He could not feel his feet; his knees shook; he was
exhausted, and Manon’s tears and clinging hands had exhausted him still
further. This flare of emotion and the exultation of it had left him
faint.
“Ma chérie, I’m done up.”
She had felt his weariness almost before he had begun to tremble, and
she became the little woman who had no more use for tears. He staggered
as she helped him towards the table by the window. He seemed to collapse
on it, bending his head till his forehead touched the wood.
“Oh, you are hurt!”
“Something to drink,” he said.
She ran to the cupboard and brought back a bottle half full of red wine,
and sitting on the table, she raised Paul and held his head against her
shoulder. It made her think of giving a sick child its drink, and an
indefinable tenderness stirred in her. She held the bottle to his lips,
letting him drink a little at a time.
“That’s better,” he said as the wine warmed him and put a new flick into
his heart; “I could eat something.”
Her shoes crunched on the broken crockery as she searched in the
cupboard for food. She brought him a slice of cold meat, and some bread
and cheese, and Paul ate—while she sat beside him. And suddenly they
seemed to become conscious of the outer world, of a rich sunset, of a
stream of golden light, and the sound of a blackbird singing. A thrill
of joy, of mystery, ran through both of them. They looked into each
other’s eyes, and kissed.