"There, there, there," he growled; and each time a sledge-hammer blow fell on Bertie. "There, there, there"--on his nose, his eyes, his mouth, his forehead--and the blows resounded dully on his skull, as if on metal. A red mist clouded Westhove's sight; everything was red-purple, scarlet, vermilion. A blood-stained medley circled round him like whirling wheels, and through that strange crimson halo a distorted face grinned up at him under the pounding of his fist. The corners of the room swam in red, as if they were full of tangible red terror, whirling, whirling round him--a purple dizziness, a scarlet madness, a nightmare bathed in blood;... and his blows fell fast and steadily--"there--there--there"--and his left hand closed tighter on the throat below that face-- The door flew open, and she, Eva, rushed up to him through the red mist, parting it, dispelling it by the swift actuality of her appearance. "Frank, Frank!" she screamed. "Stop, I entreat you! Stop! You are murdering him!" He let his arm drop, and looked at her as in a dream. She tried to drag him back, to get him away from the battered body, to which he clung in his fury like a vampire. "Leave him, Frank, I beseech you; let him stand up. Do not kill him. I was outside, and I was frightened. I did not understand, because you were speaking Dutch. Great heavens! What have you done to him? Look, look! What a state he is in!" Frank had risen to his feet, dazed by that red frenzy; he had to lean on the table. "I have given him what he deserved--I have thrashed him, and I will do it again!" He was on the point of falling on the foe once more, with that devilish grin on his face and that brutal thirst still choking him. "Frank, no. Frank!" cried Eva, clinging to him with both hands. "For God's sake be satisfied! Look at him! oh, look at him!" "Well, then, let him get up," Frank snarled. "He may get up. Get up, wretch, at once; get up!" He gave him a kick--and a second--and a third--to make him rise. But Van Maeren did not move. "Great God! only look at him," said Eva, kneeling down by the body. "Look--don't you see?" She turned to Frank, and he, as if awaking from his dream of blood, did see now, and saw with horror. There it lay: the legs and arms convulsed and writhing, the body breathlessly still in the loose, light-hued summer suit; and the face a mask of blue and green and violet, stained with purplish black, which oozed from ears and nose and mouth, trickling down, clammy and dark, drop by drop, on to the carpet. One eye was a shapeless mass, half pulp and jelly; the other stared out of the oval socket like a large, dull, melancholy opal. The throat looked as though it had a very broad purple band round it. And as they stood gazing down at the features it seemed that they were swelling, swelling to a sickening, unrecognisable deformity.