Part 49 (1/2)

”The creature has got shut up inside somehow. What is- ”

Being unable to articulate for want of breath, I threw myself at him.

It proved to be an error, but one for which I may be excused, I think. I had not observed his fingers had already pressed the latch.

Hearing our voices, the dog had begun hurling itself at the door. It burst open. Emerson staggered back against the wall, and I fell rather heavily onto the ground.

The pariah dogs of the villages are scrawny, starved creatures of indeterminate breed. They are not pets, but feral beasts who have good cause to fear and hate human beings. Those who survive the hards.h.i.+ps of early life do so because they are tougher and more vicious than their peers. And this one was mad.

It would have gone straight for Emerson's throat if I had not shoved him aside. Now it attacked the first object it saw- my foot. b.l.o.o.d.y foam flew in pink flecks from its jaws as it sank its teeth into my boot, shaking it, gnawing it. My parasol was still in my hand I brought it down on the dog's head. The blow would have stunned an animal less frenzied. It only drove this one to a more furious attack.

Emerson s.n.a.t.c.hed the parasol from me. Raising it over his head, he struck with all his strength. I heard the crack of bone and a last, agonized howl that will haunt my memory forever. The beast rolled over, thras.h.i.+ng and kicking. Emerson struck again. The sound was less sharply defined this time but equally sickening.

Emerson seized me under the arms and dragged me away from the body of the dog. His face was as white as the bandage on his cheek- whiter, if I must be accurate, for the bandage had got very dirty, and he had refused my offer to change it that morning. Abdullah stood nearby, his knife in his hand.

He was as still as a statue, and he too had gone pale.

Kneeling beside me, Emerson reached up and took Abdullah's knife. ”Start a fire,” he said. Abdullah stared blankly at him for a moment, and then nodded.

There was fuel at hand, part of Kevin's supplies. I was vaguely aware of Abdullah's rapid movements, but most of my attention, I confess, was focused on my boot, at which Emerson was slas.h.i.+ng. The laces were knotted and sticky with saliva, and the part of the boot around the ankle had been torn to shreds.

”Don't touch it!” I exclaimed. ”Your hands are always scratched and cut, an open wound-”

I broke off with a cry of pain I could not repress, as Emerson seized the boot in a savage grip and wrenched it off. Cyrus came round the corner of the house in time to hear my exclamation. Fury darkened his brow and he was, I think, about to hurl himself on Emerson when he saw the body of the dog. The color drained from his face as, with his usual quick intelligence, he grasped the significance of the scene.

”G.o.d in heaven!” he cried. ”Did it- ”

”That is what I am trying to ascertain, you d.a.m.ned fool,” said Emerson, inspecting my dirty stocking with the intense concentration of a scientist peering through a microscope. ”Keep them back,” he added, as the others hurried up, exclaiming in question and in alarm. ”And don't touch the- ”

The sound that issued from his lips was not a gasp or a groan. It was a muttered expletive. I had seen it too- such a small rent, barely an inch long. But it was large enough to mean my death.

Carefully Emerson stripped the stocking off and took my bare foot in his hand.

It is not proper to be vain about one's personal appearance, and heaven knows I had little cause, but in the privacy of these pages I will confess I had always believed I had rather pretty feet. Small and narrow, with high arches, they had been described in appreciative terms by no less an authority than Emerson himself. Now he stared fixedly, not at the appendage but at the tiny scratch on my ankle. The skin had barely been broken. There were only a few drops of blood.

For a moment no one spoke. Then Abdullah said, ”The fire burns well, Father of Curses.” He held out his hand. I thought it trembled a little.

Emerson gave him the knife.

If Ramses had been there, he would already have been talking. Kevin was almost as perniciously loquacious as my son, so I was not surprised when he was the first to break the silence. His freckles stood out dark against the pallor of his face. ”It is only the merest scratch. Perhaps the dog was not mad. Perhaps- ”

”If someone does not silence that babbling idiot of an Irishman I will knock him down,” said Emerson.

”We cannot afford to take the chance, Kevin,” I said. ”I am going to sit up now- ”

”You are not going to sit up now,” said Emerson, in the same remote voice. ”Vandergelt, make yourself useful. Put your knapsack under her head and see if you can locate a bottle of brandy.”

”I always carry a flask of brandy,” I said, fumbling at my belt. ”For medicinal purposes, of course.

There is water in this other flask.”