Wogan burst into a laugh of exultation; he saw his most dangerous enemy
striving to disentangle himself and his sword.
"Aha, my friend," he cried, "you handle a sword very prettily, but I am
the better man at cock-shies." And shutting the door to be ran down the
passage into the road.
He had seen a house that afternoon with a high garden wall about it a
quarter of a mile away. Wogan ran towards it. The mist was still thick,
but he now began to feel his strength failing. He was wounded in the
shoulder, he was stabbed in the back, and from both wounds the blood was
flowing warm. Moreover, he looked backwards once over his shoulder and
saw a lantern dancing in the road. He kept doggedly running, though his
pace slackened; he heard a shout and an answering shout behind him. He
stumbled onto his knees, picked himself up, and staggered on, labouring
his breath, dizzy. He stumbled again and fell, but as he fell he struck
against the sharp corner of the wall. If he could find an entrance into
the garden beyond that wall! He turned off the road to the left and ran
across a field, keeping close along the side of the wall. He came to
another corner and turned to the right. As he turned he heard voices in
the road. The pursuers had stopped and were searching with the lantern
for traces of his passage. He ran along the back of the wall, feeling
for a projection, a tree, anything which would enable him to climb it.
The wall was smooth, and though the branches of trees swung and creaked
above his head, their stems grew in the garden upon the other side. He
was pouring with sweat, his breath whistled, in his ears he had the
sound of innumerable armies marching across the earth, but he stumbled
on. And at last, though his right side brushed against the wall, he none
the less struck against it also with his chest. He was too dazed for the
moment to understand what had happened; all the breath he had left was
knocked clean out of his body; he dropped in a huddle on the ground.
In a little he recovered his breath; he listened and could no longer
hear any sound of voices; he began to consider. He reached a hand out in
front of him and touched the wall; he reached out a hand to the right of
him and touched the wall again. The wall projected then abruptly and
made a right angle.
Now Wogan had spent his boyhood at Rathcoffey among cliffs and rocks.
This wall, he reflected, could not be more than twelve feet high. Would
his strength last out? He came to the conclusion that it must.