he
says, with his dark smile. 'We'll put it against the girl you filched from
me, and call it an even deal. What does a happy lover want with diamonds?'
'Damn you!' cries the other, and hit him in the face. They both went down,
scuffling and panting in the sand. I stood where I was, for I weren't
going to come between them till I saw how it was going to be. Presently I
could see that Remington was stronger, and that Turold was getting the
worst of it. After a bit Turold called out, 'Thalassa!'

"I ran down at that fast enough, and got out my knife as I went. They'd
slipped down the sloping beach half-way to the sea, writhing like a couple
of the blind-worms that I kept stepping on, going over and over so quick
that I couldn't do anything at first. But one of them was sobbing in his
breath as though he was pretty well finished, and I guessed it was Turold.
Then I saw Remington's face on top, and before they could swing round
again I got a good stroke in his neck where it gleamed white in the
moonlight. The blood jumped out warm on my hand, and he rolled over so
quick that I thought I had killed him. But as I stooped over him he was up
like a flash, staggering up the steep beach, his feet plopping and sucking
in the water underneath. Turold was on his feet by that time, breathing
hard, getting back his breath. 'After him--quick!' he says to me, his face
black with rage--'he's got the diamonds.'

"I ran after him up the beach, but he heard me coming and had the start of
me. He had firm ground under him by then, and was tearing along the rocks
towards the path I'd taken them that afternoon, turning round now and
again to look back, the blood glistening in the moonlight on his white
face. There we was--him going higher and higher, me after him, and Turold
standing below on the beach, staring up at the two of us.

"Run my best, I couldn't get near him. I suppose he thought he was done
for if I caught him, and by that time my blood was pretty well up. I had
one pull over him--I knew the island, and he didn't. The path he was
taking led to the top of the island, where the crater was, with a kind of
wall of rocks round it. But before you came to that there was a great hole
which fell down God Almighty knows how deep, and was supposed to have been
another volcano at some time or other. This hole was divided into two by a
narrow ridge running right across it, and the path Remington was on took
him straight to the edge. So he'd ei