ried experiences
encountered chivalry, nobility, nor yet much gallantry in a dog, he made
no allowance for these qualities in Jan. He could not conceive that the
attack which had bowled him over was no more than a generous attempt to
save Micky Doolan. And so he thought it was a challenge to combat; and
combat, as the husky saw it, meant an effort to kill by any and every
means available. In the same way, the reckless scorn of himself and of a
palpable advantage, which Jan had shown after knocking him over, was a
thing not to be comprehended for what it really was by Sourdough. He
thought it evidence of weakening, of sudden fear, of terror inspired in
Jan by the sight of the thing he had impulsively done.

Yes, Sourdough entirely misread Jan; and he believed now that he had
ample time in which to bleed and cripple the big hound by means of his
natural wolf tactics, and then to finish off a helpless enemy at
leisure. Cunning often does mislead those who possess it. In this case
it was responsible for tactics by which, had he but known it, Sourdough
presented his enemy with triple-thick armor, and schooled him finely for
the task that lay before him.

Sourdough's second slash cost Jan a split ear, but gave him flashlight
vision of his fight with Grip in Sussex, with Grip of the wolf-like
fighting methods. Sourdough's third attack cost Jan a burning groove
down his hitherto untouched shoulder; but, by that token, it effectually
completed the lesson of attack number two, and brought a final end to
the period of Sourdough's really enjoyable fighting. So poorly, then,
did Sourdough's cunning serve him, that his fourth attack came near to
costing him his life.

With bloody glee in his eyes, and wide-parted drooling jaws, he darted
in to take his fourth cut at Jan, eager for the joyous moment in which
the repetition of these slashes should have reduced Jan to ripeness for
the killing thrust--the throat-hold. But Jan had learned his lesson. At
the psychological fraction of a moment he changed his position, and,
instead of passing on comfortably through space after his attack,
Sourdough's shoulder met another bigger shoulder, braced like a granite
buttress to receive the impact, and the husky reached earth on his side.
That rather shook the wind out of him; but that was nothing by
comparison with the fact that, in the same moment, Jan's viselike jaws
closed about one side of his neck, close in to the skull where the hair
short