.. "what is between you and me needs no recounting. You know it too
well--I likewise. It is my wish and my intention to kill you with my
two hands. Nothing can prevent that, not even what you count upon, my
reluctance--to you incomprehensible--to commit an act of violence in the
presence of a woman. But because Miss Brooke is here, because you have
brought her here by force, because you are what you are and so have treated
her insolently ... before we come to our final accounting, you shall get
down upon your knees and ask her pardon."
He saw no yielding in the eyes of the Prussian, only arrogance; and when he
paused, he was answered in one phrase of the gutters of Berlin, couched in
the imagery of its lowest boozing-kens, so unspeakably vile in essence
and application that Lanyard heard it with an incredulity almost
stupefying--almost, not altogether.
It was barely spoken when those lips that framed it were crushed by a blow
of such lightning delivery that, though he must have been prepared for it,
Ekstrom's guard was still lowered as he reeled back, lost footing, and went
to his knees.
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