h the right he was groping about
him in a dazed sort of way. It struck against the wall, and his body
seemed to express a muscular and physical relief at the contact, as
though he had found his bearings, his location in space as well as
something against which to lean.

Then I saw red again. All my wrongs and humiliations flashed upon me
with a dazzling brightness, all that I had suffered and others had
suffered at his hands, all the enormity of the man's very existence. I
sprang upon him, blindly, insanely, and drove the knife into his
shoulder. I knew, then, that it was no more than a flesh wound,--I had
felt the steel grate on his shoulder-blade,--and I raised the knife to
strike at a more vital part.

But Maud had seen my first blow, and she cried, "Don't! Please don't!"

I dropped my arm for a moment, and a moment only. Again the knife was
raised, and Wolf Larsen would have surely died had she not stepped
between. Her arms were around me, her hair was brushing my face. My
pulse rushed up in an unwonted manner, yet my rage mounted with it. She
looked me bravely in the eyes.

"For my sake," she begged.

"I would kill him for your sake!" I cried, trying to free my arm without
hurting her.

"Hush!" she said, and laid her fingers lightly on my lips. I could have
kissed them, had I dared, even then, in my rage, the touch of them was so
sweet, so very sweet. "Please, please," she pleaded, and she disarmed me
by the words, as I was to discover they would ever disarm me.

I stepped back, separating from her, and replaced the knife in its
sheath. I looked at Wolf Larsen. He still pressed his left hand against
his forehead. It covered his eyes. His head was bowed. He seemed to
have grown limp. His body was sagging at the hips, his great shoulders
were drooping and shrinking forward.

"Van, Weyden!" he called hoarsely, and with a note of fright in his
voice. "Oh, Van Weyden! where are you?"

I looked at Maud. She did not speak, but nodded her head.

"Here I am," I answered, stepping to his side. "What is the matter?"

"Help me to a seat," he said, in the same hoarse, frightened voice.

"I am a sick man; a very sick man, Hump," he said, as he left my
sustaining grip and sank into a chair.

His head dropped forward on the table and was buried in his hands. From
time to time it rocked back and forward as with pain. Once, when he half
raised it, I saw the sweat standing in heavy drops on his fo