Page:Hugh Pendexter--Tiberius Smith.djvu/342

 spearmen. I couldn't hold 'em, and so I just dropped the cutter-bar and pulled out my junk, hoping at least to muss up a few before I was registered.

"Then a mighty cry behind me caused me to turn, and if there wasn't old Tiberius coming along after me like a madman, his machine jumping and swaying, and he with reins in his teeth, a big gun in each hand, yelling through the leather like a fiend. I had never seen him aroused to that pitch before. He had tossed her lordship to the sailors and was back to play in my drama. And as the heat of it got into my blood, mingled with a passionate liking for the old chap, I added my war-cry to the general effect and insanely urged my brutes onward still faster.

"Then came a shock and all was nothing. When I recovered my senses we were well out to sea and old Tiberius had been left behind. They told me how I had received a blow from a club and how he had drove on and on and had pressed the frenzied mob back, fighting like a demon, until the rear-guard could advance and drag me to the beach. The last seen of him was when he swept over the hill in a swirl of weapons and plunging men. I begged the captain to put about and return, but he was obdurate. Nor would he listen to the hysterical pleading of her lordship. And a species of madness coming on me, I tried to take the wheel from the pilot, and then collapsed. When I awoke again I found I was