He made no move to strike again;
he was too intensely interested in anticipation of the sight he thought
to gloat over. The delectable spectacle did not seem to come. The
victim's fresh color did not fade; his bright eyes did not grow dim.
"Missed," said Roger quietly, withdrawing his wet hand from its
exploration. "Hit a rib. Now, cur, do your damnedest!"
He walked forward toward the outpointed knife, walked straight-limbed
and head up, his shoulders squared, his jaw set in fashion that
indicated how completely caution had been flung aside.
But the man was watching the blue eyes and he was of the breed that
cannot fight fair. He quailed before the Northern relentlessness, bred
of kinship with the relentless Northern ice, that showed in those blue
eyes. He could not fathom what was in the look that chilled him; his
breed never could; but one thing he understood: He had met his master.
He gave ground a foot, the knife still held out before him. He gave a
yard. He wilted, became panic-stricken, turned and fled to his horse
and galloped away. Well out of reach he turned and waved his blade in
a dramatic threat. Then he disappeared behind an islet of palmetto
scrub.
XIX
Payne stalked back to where Higgins and his negroes were slashing into
the elderberry brush.
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