They had to go by tram. The boxer was twenty yards behind them. They hurried on, mounted the tram just as it was starting, and congratulated themselves on having avoided him. When they reached the bridge there he was sitting on the parapet, whistling and leering. Matilda flamed scarlet and turned to go. Boiling with fury Old Mole hunched up his shoulders, tucked down his head (the attitude familiar to so many Thrigsbians), and bore down on the offender. He grunted out: "Be off." " 'Ave you bought the bally bridge?" And he grinned. The coarseness and beastliness of the creature revolted Mr. Mole, roused him to such a pitch of furious disgust, that he lost all sense of what he was doing, raised his stick, struck out, caught the fellow in the chest and sent him toppling over into the pool. He leaned over the parapet and watched the man floundering and splashing and gulping and spitting and cursing, saw his face turn greeny white with hard terror, but was entirely unmoved until he felt Matilda's hand on his arm and heard her blubbering and crying: "He's drowning! He's drowning!" Then he rushed down and lay on his stomach on the bank and held out his stick, further, further, as far as he could reach, until the lout in the water clutched it. The boxer had lost his head. He tugged at the stick and it looked for a moment as though there would be two men in the water. It was a question which would first be exhausted. Grayer and grayer and more distorted grew the boxer's face, redder and redder and more swollen Old Mole's, until at last the strain relaxed and Matilda's tormentor was drawn into shallow water and out on to the bank. There he lay drenched, hiccoughing, spitting, concerned entirely with his own discomfort and giving never a thought either to the object of his desires or his assailant and rescuer. At last he shook himself like a dog, squeezed the water out of his sleeves, sprang to his feet and was off like a dart along the towpath in the direction of the tall fuming chimneys of the town. Matilda and Old Mole walked slowly out toward the setting sun and in front of them for miles stretched the regiments of pollarded willows like mournful distorted human beings condemned forever to stand and watch over the still waters. "Life," said Old Mole, "is full of astonishments. I should never have thought it of myself." "He was very nearly drowned," rejoined Matilda. "It is very singular," said he, more to himself than to her, "that one's instinct should think such a life worth saving. A more bestial face I never saw." "I think," said she, "you would help anybody whatever they were like." She took his arm and they walked on, as it seemed, into the darkness. Until they turned, neither spoke. He said: "I am oddly miserable when I think that in a fortnight the school will reopen and I shall not be there. I suppose it's habit, but I want to go back and I know I never shall." "I don't want never to go back."