Then the tramps insisted again that Pretty wait for them to come up.  But when he continued to walk without answering them, they began to hurl oaths and rocks, and to run toward him.  Now Pretty thought that discretion was the better half of valor, and he seized Enid’s wrist and started off on a run, an act in which she was willing enough to follow his lead.  But he had to explain, just to preserve his dignity: 

“They’re three to one, you know.”

But while Enid understood well enough the necessity for speed, she had no breath to expend expressing her appreciation of Pretty’s delicate position.  She was too frightened to run even as well as she knew how, and she was going at a gait that was neither very fast nor very economical of muscle and breath.  Pretty, however, ran scientifically:  on the balls of his feet, with his head erect, his chest out, and his lips tightly locked.

But before long he was doing all the work for two, and laboring like a ship that drags its anchor in a storm.  They came to a hill now, and here Enid leaned her whole weight upon him.  He barely managed, with the most tremendous determination and exertion, to get her to the top of this long incline.  As they labored up he decided in his own mind, and told her, that she must leave him and run on for help.

Just one tenth of a second his terrified mind had been occupied with the thought that he might run on alone and leave her.  The tempting idea of self-preservation had whispered to him that if he stayed behind, it would only result in disaster to two, while if he ran on alone, at least one would be saved.

But this cowardly selfishness he put away after the tenth of a second of thought, and now he was insisting, even against Enid’s gasping objection, that she must run on alone and leave him to take care of the footpads.  He did not know how he was going to do this, but he felt that upon him devolved the duty of being the zealous rear-guard to cover the retreat of a vanquished army.

Enid, however, was stubborn, and proposed to stay and fight with him, even drawing out a very sharp and very dangerous hat-pin to emphasize her courage.  But Pretty, while he blessed her for her bravery and her full-heartedness, still commanded her to run on and bring help, promising her that he would keep out of harm’s way till help could come.  With this assurance, the poor girl staggered on, gaining strength from the necessity of speed to save her beloved Pretty.

At the brow of the hill Pretty found himself alone, and turned and looked at the on-coming trio with defiant sternness.  After a moment, which gave him some much-needed rest and a chance to gain new breath, he realized that one half a battle is with the warrior that is wise enough to make the first onslaught.  So, after a tremor of very natural hesitation, the boy dashed full at the three hulkish tramps.

XXI