but had arrived now in the nick of time while the brig was casting anchor.
Saskia had said that he had a devil's brain, and Dickson, as he stared
at him, saw a fiendish cleverness in his straight brows and a
remorseless cruelty in his stiff jaw and his pale eyes.

He achieved the bravest act of his life. Shaky and dizzy as he was,
with freedom newly opened to him and the mental torments of his
captivity still an awful recollection, he did not hesitate.
He saw before him the villain of the drama, the one man that
stood between the Princess and peace of mind. He regarded
no consequences, gave no heed to his own fate, and thought
only how to put his enemy out of action. There was a by spanner
lying on the ground. He seized it and with all his strength
smote at the man's face.

The motor-cyclist, kneeling and working hard at his machine,
had raised his head at Dickson's approach and beheld a wild apparition-
-a short man in ragged tweeds, with a bloody brow and long smears of
blood on his cheeks. The next second he observed the threat of attack,
and ducked his head so that the spanner only grazed his scalp.
The motor-bicycle toppled over, its owner sprang to his feet, and found
the short man, very pale and gasping, about to renew the assault.
In such a crisis there was no time for inquiry, and the cyclist was
well trained in self-defence. He leaped the prostrate bicycle,
and before his assailant could get in a blow brought his left fist
into violent contact with his chin. Dickson tottered a step or two
and then subsided among the bracken.

He did not lose his senses, but he had no more strength in him.
He felt horribly ill, and struggled in vain to get up. The cyclist,