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high, and hit him fair and square on the temple; and down he went on
Siss at prostrate Ugh-lomi's feet.
But before Ugh-lomi could get up, the two red-haired men were tumbling
out of the reeds, spears and smiting-stones ready, and Snake hard behind
them. One she struck on the neck, but not to fell him, and he blundered
aside and spoilt his brother's blow at Ugh-lomi's head. In a moment
Ugh-lomi dropped his club and had his assailant by the waist, and had
pitched him sideways sprawling. He snatched at his club again and
recovered it. The man Eudena had hit stabbed at her with his spear as he
stumbled from her blow, and involuntarily she gave ground to avoid him.
He hesitated between her and Ugh-lomi, half turned, gave a vague cry at
finding Ugh-lomi so near, and in a moment Ugh-lomi had him by the
throat, and the club had its third victim. As he went down Ugh-lomi
shouted--no words, but an exultant cry.
The other red-haired man was six feet from her with his back to her, and
a darker red streaking his head. He was struggling to his feet. She had
an irrational impulse to stop his rising. She flung the axe at him,
missed, saw his face in profile, and he had swerved beyond little Si,
and was running through the reeds. She had a transitory vision of Snake
standing in the throat of the path, half turned away from her, and then
she saw his back. She saw the club whirling through the air, and the
shock head of Ugh-lomi, with blood in the hair and blood upon the
shoulder, vanishing below the reeds in pursuit. Then she heard Snake
scream like a woman.
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