A
second day, a third night, and a third day came. With each hour grew his
anxiety for Jean's return. At times he was almost feverish to have the
affair over with. He was confident of the outcome, and yet he did not
fail to take the Frenchman's true measurement. He knew that Jean was
like live wire and steel, as agile as a cat, more than a match with
himself in open fight despite his own superior weight and size. He
devised a dozen schemes for Jean's undoing. One was to leap on him
while he was eating; another to spring on him and choke him into partial
insensibility as he knelt beside his pack or fed the fire; a third to
strike a blow from behind that would render him powerless. But there was
something in this last that was repugnant to him. He remembered that
Jean had saved his life, that in no instance had he given him physical
pain. He would watch for an opportunity, take advantage of the
Frenchman, as Croisset had taken advantage of him, but he would not hurt
him seriously. It should be as fair a struggle as Jean had offered him,
and with the handicap in his favor the best man would win.
On the morning of the fourth day Howland was awakened by a sound that
came through the aperture in the wall.
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