y succeeded in avoiding the sledge-hammer fist,
though it missed his head, it struck glancingly on the left shoulder.
numbing for the moment the whole arm. Sanderson countered as the blow
fell, by bringing his right arm up with all his force and striking
David on the face. He sank to his knees, like a wounded bull, but was
on his feet again before Sanderson could follow up his advantage.

David, heedless of the pain and fast flowing blood, rushed a third
time, catching Sanderson in a corner of the room whence he could not
escape.

In an instant, the two were locked in a death-like grip.

To and fro they reeled. No sound could be heard save the snapping of
brands on the hearth, the shuffle of moving feet and the short gasps of
struggling men.

In that terrible grasp, Sanderson's strength was as a child's.

He could not call into play any of the wrestling tricks that were his,
all he could do was to keep his feet and wait for the madman's strength
to expend itself.

The iron grip about his body seemed to slacken for a moment. He
wriggled free, and caught the fatal underhold.

By this new grip, he forced David's body backward till the larger man's
spine bade fair to snap.

David felt himself caught in a trap. Exerting all his giant strength
he forced one arm down between their close-locked bodies, and clasped
his other hand on Sanderson's face, pushing two fingers into his
eyeballs.

No man can endure this torture. Sanderson loosed his hold. David had
caught him by the right wrist and the left knee, stooping until his own
shoulders were under the other's thigh. Then, with this leverage, he
whirled Sanderson high in the air above his head and threw him with all
his force down upon the hearth.

A shower of sparks arose and the strong smell of burning clothes, as
Sanderson, stunned and helpless, lay across the blazing fire-place.

For a moment, David thought to leave his vanquished foe to his own
fate, then he turned back. What was the use? It could not right the
wrong he had done to Anna. He bent over Sanderson, extinguished the
fire, pulled the unconscious man to the open door and left him.

It came to David like an inspiration that he had not thought of the
lake; the ice was thin on the southern shore below where the river
emptied. Suppose she had gone there; suppose in her utter desolation
she had gone there to end it all? Imagination, quickened by suspense
and suffering, ran to meet calamity;