Clementina

Wogan burst into a laugh of exultation; he saw his most dangerous enemy

striving to disentangle himself and his sword.

"Aha, my friend," he cried, "you handle a sword very prettily, but I am

the better man at cock-shies." And shutting the door to be ran down the

passage into the road.

He had seen a house that afternoon with a high garden wall about it a

quarter of a mile away. Wogan ran towards it. The mist was still thick,

but he now began to feel his strength failing. He was wounded in the

shoulder, he was stabbed in the back, and from both wounds the blood was

flowing warm. Moreover, he looked backwards once over his shoulder and

saw a lantern dancing in the road. He kept doggedly running, though his

pace slackened; he heard a shout and an answering shout behind him. He

stumbled onto his knees, picked himself up, and staggered on, labouring

his breath, dizzy. He stumbled again and fell, but as he fell he struck

against the sharp corner of the wall. If he could find an entrance into

the garden beyond that wall! He turned off the road to the left and ran

across a field, keeping close along the side of the wall. He came to

another corner and turned to the right. As he turned he heard voices in

the road. The pursuers had stopped and were searching with the lantern

for traces of his passage. He ran along the back of the wall, feeling

for a projection, a tree, anything which would enable him to climb it.

The wall was smooth, and though the branches of trees swung and creaked

above his head, their stems grew in the garden upon the other side. He

was pouring with sweat, his breath whistled, in his ears he had the

sound of innumerable armies marching across the earth, but he stumbled

on. And at last, though his right side brushed against the wall, he none

the less struck against it also with his chest. He was too dazed for the

moment to understand what had happened; all the breath he had left was

knocked clean out of his body; he dropped in a huddle on the ground.

In a little he recovered his breath; he listened and could no longer

hear any sound of voices; he began to consider. He reached a hand out in

front of him and touched the wall; he reached out a hand to the right of

him and touched the wall again. The wall projected then abruptly and

made a right angle.

Now Wogan had spent his boyhood at Rathcoffey among cliffs and rocks.

This wall, he reflected, could not be more than twelve feet high. Would

his strength last out? He came to the conclusion that it must.