It had come to him definitely
in the savage outcry of joy when he was down. There was to be no mercy.
He had read the ominous decree. And Brokaw....
He was like a madman as he came toward him again. There was no longer
the leer on his face. There was in his battered and swollen countenance
but one emotion. Blood and hurt could not hide it. It blazed like fires
in his half-closed eyes. It was the desire to kill. The passion which
quenches itself in the taking of life, and every fibre in David's brain
rose to meet it. He knew that it was no longer a matter of blows on his
part--it was like the David of old facing Goliath with his bare hands.
Curiously the thought of Goliath came to him in these flashing moments.
Here, too, there must be trickery, something unexpected, a deadly
stratagem, and his brain must work out his salvation quickly. Another
two or three minutes and it would be over one way or the other. He made
his decision. The tricks of his own art were inadequate, but there was
still one hope--one last chance. It was the so-called "knee-break" of
the bush country, a horrible thing, he had thought, when Father Roland
had taught it to him. "Break your opponent's knees," the Missioner had
said, "and you've got him.
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