166 



THE RAT 



by reason of the inraicible courage that was in us, 

 and I vowed that, rather than leave my friend to 

 the doom of such a A\dfe, I would see him stretched 

 lifeless at my feet and marry her myself, kno\^ing 

 full well that the bitterness of the marriage would 

 be ample atonement for the murder. 



And so it fell out, for luck gave me the advantage 

 of him, and a sudden shift of grip sent my teeth home 

 in his wiry throat, and even as I clenched my jaws 

 I saw the death-film steal over the lustrous black 

 of his beady eye, and when I loosed my hold he 

 fell away from me a corpse, and the river received 

 him and carried him away among the other flotsam 

 and jetsam that at times encumbered its rippling 

 current, to make food for who knows what lowly 

 and unseemly forms of life. 



Well, he died in fair fight, and I, the sur\ivor, 

 endured for some days to share my home with my 

 new bride, my home and his. But the cra}^sh 

 were faihng in the pool, and the memory of my 

 lost fi'iend seemed to hang about the little bays 

 and headlands, so, with few^ adieus spoken and no 

 tears shed, for she had but the heart of a slug, I 

 left the wife wiio had cost me the price of a true 

 friend, and set forth once more upon my travels 

 downstream. 



