Page:Delight - de la Roche - 1926.djvu/223

 "Got me! It's me that's got you. I'll throw you into the lagoon as quick as look at you."

"We'll see whether you're going to come back to this town and ruin our business after I've put you out."

"I'll come any place I like—"

"And ruin our men, too."

Delight thought: "If I can get hold of her wrists, I'll put her down on her knees and make her say she's sorry. She might get drowned if I threw her in the water." She moved towards Mrs. Jessop, holding her eyes with hers.

The housekeeper glared at her and again uttered that strange deep whistle which came from her coarse lips like a spring of sweet water from rough clay. . . . At the note every tree and shrub and clump of spiny undergrowth seemed to come alive. In every place that a woman could hide, there was a woman hidden. Like birds of prey, with skirts that flapped like flapping wings, uttering cries of rage and exultation, they swooped forth.

The sun had set. The bright space where the two stood became dusk as the other women gathered about them. For one instant Delight had seen their faces, transfigured by the last fiery glow into strange burning masks, more like metal than flesh, with jewels for eyes. Now, as the shadows fell, she only saw them surging about her, blurred, menacing, darker shadows from the shadow.

She struck out at them, as they surrounded her.

"Don't dare touch me!" she shrieked. "Keep your hands off me!"

She grasped the one nearest her and threw her to the ground. She caught the next by the throat and threw her into a bush. One from behind tore off her velvet tam. Another pulled down her hair. She turned and faced them like a wild thing at bay. A short girl with a broad flat