OH NO. You won’t kill him. You won’t have to. I’ll do it. The little swine . . . I’ll kill him myself, if it’s true.
It seemed to Spig O’Leary he must be shouting it, the way his throat was torn. But Sudley didn’t seem to hear him. He was going methodically about his business, helping the boy unhitch the disker and load it on to the truck. They were lumbering across the narrow bridge over the drainage run down into Plumtree Cove, going out Miss Fairlie’s lane to the old road, when the red haze blinding Spig finally dissolved and he found himself standing there alone.
He got back into his car and drove on to the pineapple-topped gate posts fifty feet along in the woods on the right. There were two signs, one saying “O’Leary”, the other, “Stanley S. Ashton”. He was conscious of a sort of b
