A CONQUERING COWARD
She was gone? I must tramp, then, and quickly! I roll’d off, and got to my feet—
He didn’t! The lightning grinn’d out, and I saw him complete....
Tall, strongly-built: twisted-up....Face? he hadn’t one—Ay, it was bad;
But, what shocking and scaring I’d got any use for, I reckon’d I’d had;
And things somehow were different: no longer a monster, a warning, a Dread—
Just human and helpless he lay there; and lonely; and dead.
What could I do for him, I, his one comrade? Maybe I could send
Word for him, somehow, to mother or children, or sweetheart, or friend?
Gently I search’d the poor heap....The one bad bit in that was the thought
That may be he might have dispatches?—Thank God, though, he’d not:
I hadn’t to rob him, the poor finish’d fellow! A scorch’d pocket-book,
That might give his name, and the people to tell, I discover’d and took;
Then, I reverently settled him straight as I could, shook his....wrist, for Good-bye;
And there I’d to leave him, alone.
On! the drift was flood-high,
113
