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LONDON MATHEMATICAL SOCIETY STUDENT TEXTS

Managing editor: Professor D. J. Benson,

Department of Mathematics, University of Aberdeen, UK

17 Aspects of quantum field theory in curved spacetime, S. A. FULLING

18 Braids and coverings: selected topics, VAGN LUNDSGAARD HANSEN
20 Communication theory, C. M. GOLDIE & R. G. E. PINCH
21 Representations of finite groups of Lie type, FRANCOIS DIGNE & JEAN MICHEL
22 Designs, graphs, codes and their links, P. J. CAMERON & J. H. VAN LINT
23 Complex algebraic curves, FRANCES KIRWAN
24 Lectures on elliptic curves, J. W. S. CASSELS
26 An introduction to the theory of L-functions and Eisenstein series, H. HIDA
27 Hilbert Space: compact operators and the trace theorem, J. R. RETHERFORD
28 Potential theory in the complex plane, T. RANSFORD
29 Undergraduate commutative algebra, M. REID
31 The Laplacian on a Riemannian manifold, S. ROSENBERG
32 Lectures on Lie groups and Lie algebras, R. CARTER, G. SEGAL & I. MACDONALD
33 A primer of algebraic D-modules, S. C. COUTINHO
34 Complex algebraic surfaces, A. BEAUVILLE
35 Young tableaux, W. FULTON
37 A mathematical introduction to wavelets, P. WOJTASZCZYK
38 Harmonic maps, loop groups, and integrable systems, M. GUEST
39 Set theory for the working mathematician, K. CIESIELSKI
40 Ergodic theory and dynamical systems, M. POLLICOTT & M. YURI
41 The algorithmic resolution of diophantine equations, N. P. SMART
42 Equilibrium states in ergodic theory, G. KELLER
43 Fourier analysis on finite groups and applications, AUDREY TERRAS
44 Classical invariant theory, PETER J. OLVER
45 Permutation groups, P. J. CAMERON
46 Riemann surfaces: A primer, A. BEARDON
47 Introductory lectures on rings and modules, J. BEACHY
48 Set theory, A HAJNAL & P. HAMBURGER
49 K-theory for C*-algebras, M. RØRDAM, F. LARSEN & N. LAUSTSEN
50 A brief guide to algebraic number theory, H. P. F. SWINNERTON-DYER
51 Steps in commutative algebra: Second edition, R. Y. SHARP
52 Finite Markov chains and algorithmic applications, O. HÄGGSTRÖM
53 The prime number theorem, G. J. O. JAMESON
54 Topics in graph automorphisms and reconstruction, J. LAURI & R. SCAPELLATO
55 Elementary number theory, group theory, and Ramanujan graphs, G. DAVIDOFF,
P. SARNAK & A. VALETTE
56 Logic, induction and sets, T. FORSTER
57 Introduction to Banach algebras and harmonic analysis, H. G. DALES et al.
58 Computational algebraic geometry, HAL SCHENCK
59 Frobenius algebras and 2-D topological quantum field theories, J. KOCK
60 Linear operators and linear systems, J. R. PARTINGTON
61 An introduction to noncommutative Noetherian rings, K. R. GOODEARL &
R. B. WARFIELD
62 Topics from one dimensional dynamics, K. M. BRUCKS & H. BRUIN
63 Singularities of plane curves, C. T. C. WALL
64 A short course on Banach space theory, N. L. CAROTHERS
65 Elements of the representation theory of associative algebras Volume I, I. ASSEM,
A. SKOWROŃSKI & D. SIMSON
66 An introduction to sieve methods and their applications, A. C. COJOCARU &
M. R. MURTY
67 Elliptic functions, V. ARMITAGE & W. F. EBERLEIN
68 Hyperbolic geometry from a local viewpoint, L. KEEN & N. LAKIC
69 Lectures on Kähler geometry, A. MOROIANU
70 Dependence Logic, J. VÄÄNÄNEN
 Elements of the
Representation Theory
of Associative Algebras

3: Representation-Infinite Tilted Algebras

Daniel Simson and Andrzej Skowroński

Toruń, June 2007

 London Mathematical Society Student Texts 72

Elements of the Representation Theory

of Associative Algebras
Volume 3 Representation-Infinite
Tilted Algebras

DANIEL SIMSON
Nicolaus Copernicus University

ANDRZEJ SKOWROŃSKI
Nicolaus Copernicus University
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo

Cambridge University Press

The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK
Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York
www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521882187

© D. Simson and A. Skowronski 2007

This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of

relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place
without the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published in print format 2007

ISBN-13 978-0-511-35596-7 eBook (NetLibrary)

ISBN-10 0-511-35596-3 eBook (NetLibrary)

ISBN-13 978-0-521-88218-7 hardback

ISBN-10 0-521-88218-4 hardback

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls
for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not
guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
 To our Wives

Sabina and Miroslawa

 Contents

Introduction page ix

XV. Tubular extensions and tubular coextensions

of algebras 1
XV.1. One-point extensions and one-point coextensions of
algebras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
XV.2. Tubular extensions and tubular coextensions of algebras . 19
XV.3. Branch extensions and branch coextensions of algebras . . 39
XV.4. Tubular extensions and tubular coextensions of concealed
algebras of Euclidean type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
XV.5. Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

XVI. Branch algebras 65

XVI.1. Branches and finite line extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
XVI.2. Tilted algebras of an equioriented type Am . . . . . . . . . 78
XVI.3. Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

XVII. Tilted algebras of Euclidean type 103

XVII.1. Stone cones in hereditary standard stable tubes . . . . . . 104
XVII.2. Tilting with hereditary standard stable tubes . . . . . . . 108
XVII.3. Representation-infinite tilted algebras of Euclidean
type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
XVII.4. Domestic tubular extensions and domestic tubular
coextensions of concealed algebras of Euclidean type . . . 163
XVII.5. A classification of tilted algebras of Euclidean type . . . . 184
XVII.6. A controlled property of the Euler form of tilted
algebras of Euclidean type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
XVII.7. Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209

vii
viii Contents

XVIII. Wild hereditary algebras and tilted algebras

of wild type 213
XVIII.1. Regular components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
XVIII.2. Homomorphisms between regular modules . . . . . . . . . 231
XVIII.3. Perpendicular categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
XVIII.4. Wild behaviour of the module category . . . . . . . . . . 269
XVIII.5. Tilted algebras of wild type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
XVIII.6. Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305

XIX. Tame and wild representation type of algebras 309

XIX.1. Wild representation type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310
XIX.2. Indecomposable modules over the polynomial
algebra K[t] . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332
XIX.3. Tame representation type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
XIX.4. Exercises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 356

XX. Perspectives 359

XX.1. Components of the Auslander–Reiten quiver of an algebra 360
XX.2. The Tits quadratic form of an algebra . . . . . . . . . . . 366
XX.3. Tilted and quasitilted algebras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 374
XX.4. Algebras of small homological dimensions . . . . . . . . . 386
XX.5. Selfinjective algebras of tilted and quasitilted type . . . . 396
XX.6. Related topics and research directions . . . . . . . . . . . 403
Bibliography 405
Index 451
List of symbols 455
 Introduction
The first volume serves as a general introduction to some of the tech-
niques most commonly used in representation theory. The quiver technique,
the Auslander–Reiten theory and the tilting theory were presented with
some application to finite dimensional algebras over a fixed algebraically
closed field. In particular, a complete classification of those hereditary al-
gebras that are representation-finite (that is, admit only finitely many iso-
morphism classes of indecomposable modules) is given. The result, known
as Gabriel’s theorem, asserts that a basic connected hereditary algebra A is
representation-finite if and only if the quiver QA of A is a Dynkin quiver.
In Volume 2 we study in detail the indecomposable modules and the
shape of the Auslander–Reiten quiver Γ(mod A) of the class of hereditary
algebras A that are representation-infinite and minimal with respect to this
property. They are just the hereditary algebras of Euclidean type, that
is, the path algebras KQ, where Q is a connected acyclic quiver whose
underlying non-oriented graph Q is one of the following Euclidean diagrams

 • HH
 HH
A 
 n : •− −−−− · · · −−−−•−−H
−−−• −•; (n+1 vertices, n ≥ 1);
 • •
Dn : | |
•−−−−•−−−−•−−−− · · · −−−−•−−−−•−−−−•; (n+1 vertices, n ≥ 4);
•
6 : |
E •
|
•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•;
7 : •
E |
•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•;
8 : •
E |
•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•−−−−•.
In Volume 2, we also study in detail the indecomposable modules and the
shape of the Auslander–Reiten quiver Γ(mod B) of concealed algebras of
Euclidean type, that is, the tilted algebras B of the form

B = End TKQ ,

where KQ is a hereditary algebra of Euclidean type and TKQ is a postpro-

jective tilting KQ-module.
The main aim of the first part of Volume 3 is to study arbitrary represen-
tation-infinite tilted algebras B = End TKQ of a Euclidean type Q, where
TKQ is a tilting TKQ -module, and to give a fairly complete description
of their indecomposable modules, their module categories mod B, and the
Auslander–Reiten quivers Γ(mod B).
For this purpose, we introduce in Chapters XV-XVII some concepts
and tools that allow us to give in Chapter XVII a complete description
of arbitrary representation-infinite tilted algebras B of Euclidean type and

ix
x Introduction

their module categories mod B, due to Ringel [525]. In particular, we show

that:

• the Auslander–Reiten quiver Γ(modB) of any such an algebra B has

a disjoint union decomposition

Γ(modB) = P(B) ∪ T B ∪ Q(B),

where P(B) is a unique postprojective component, Q(B) is a unique

preinjective component, and

T B = {TλB }λ∈P1 (K)

is a P1 (K)-family of pairwise orthogonal standard ray or coray tubes

TλB separating P(B) from Q(B);

• the module category mod B of a tilted algebra B of Euclidean type is

controlled by the Euler quadratic form qB : K0 (B) −→ Z of B, and

• the number of the isomorphism classes of tilted algebras of Euclidean

type of any fixed dimension is finite.

In Chapter XVIII, we turn our attention to the representation theory of

wild hereditary algebras A = KQ, where Q is an acyclic quiver such that
the underlying graph is neither a Dynkin nor a Euclidean diagram. The
shape of the components of the regular part R(A) of Γ(mod A) is described
and, for any such an algebra A, a wild behaviour of the category mod A is
established. Moreover, an important theorem on homomorphisms between
the regular modules over a wild hereditary algebra, due to Baer [35] and
Kerner [343], is proved.
An essential rôle in the investigation is played by the notion of a per-
pendicular category associated to a partial tilting module, introduced by
Geigle and Lenzing [247] and Schofield [559].
We also exhibit some classes of tilted algebras B of wild type and we
discuss the structure of their module categories mod B. In particular, we
prove a theorem of Ringel [526] on the existence of a regular tilting module
over a hereditary algebra, and we present an efficient procedure of Baer [35],
[36] allowing us to construct regular tilting modules over any wild hereditary
algebra A with at least three pairwise non-isomorphic simple modules.
In Chapter XIX, we introduce the concepts of tame representation type
and of wild representation type for algebras, and we discuss the tame and
the wild nature of module categories mod B. We prove that the concealed
algebras of Euclidean type are of tame representation type, and the con-
cealed algebras of wild type are of wild representation type.
 Introduction xi

In the final Chapter XX, we present (without proofs) selected results

of the representation theory of finite dimensional algebras that are related
to the material discussed in the previous chapters. This, together with a
rather long list of complementary references, should provide the reader with
the right tives for further study and interesting research directions.
Unfortunately, many important topics from the theory have been left
out. Among the most notable omissions are covering techniques, the use
of derived categories and partially ordered sets. Some other aspects of the
theory presented here are discussed in the books [34], [53], [54], [242], [318],
[276], [575], and especially [525].
We assume that the reader is familiar with Volumes 1 and 2, but other-
wise the exposition is reasonably self-contained, making it suitable either for
courses and seminars or for self-study. The text includes many illustrative
examples and a large number of exercises at the end of each of the Chapters
XV-XIX.
The book is addressed to graduate students, advanced undergraduates,
and mathematicians and scientists working in representation theory, ring
and module theory, commutative algebra, abelian group theory, and combi-
natorics. It should also, we hope, be of interest to mathematicians working
in other fields.
Throughout this book we use freely the terminology and notation intro-
duced in Volumes 1 and 2. We denote by K a fixed algebraically closed field.
The symbols N, Z, Q, R, and C mean the sets of natural numbers, integers,
rational, real, and complex numbers. The cardinality of a set X is denoted
by |X|. Given an algebra A, the A-module means a finite dimensional right
A-module. We denote by Mod A the category of all right A-modules, by
mod A the category of finite dimensional right A-modules, and by Γ(mod A)
the Auslander–Reiten translation quiver of A. The ordinary quiver of an
algebra A is denoted by QA . Given a matrix C = [cij ], we denote by C t the
transpose of C.
A finite quiver Q = (Q0 , Q1 ) is called a Euclidean quiver if the under-
lying graph Q of Q is any of the Euclidean diagrams A  m , with m ≥ 1, D  m,
  
with m ≥ 4, E6 , E7 , and E8 . Analogously, Q is called a Dynkin quiver
if the underlying graph Q of Q is any of the Dynkin diagrams Am , with
m ≥ 1, Dm , with m ≥ 4, E6 , E7 , and E8 .
We take pleasure in thanking all our colleagues and students who helped
us with their useful comments and suggestions. We wish particularly to ex-
press our appreciation to Ibrahim Assem, Sheila Brenner, Otto Kerner, and
Kunio Yamagata for their helpful discussions and suggestions. Particular
thanks are due to Dr. Jerzy Bialkowski and Dr. Rafal Bocian for their help
in preparing a print-ready copy of the manuscript.
 Chapter XV

Tubular extensions and tubular

coextensions of algebras
In Volume 2, we study in detail the indecomposable modules and the
shape of the Auslander–Reiten quiver Γ(mod B) of concealed algebras of
Euclidean type, that is, the tilted algebras B of the form

B = End TKQ ,

where KQ is a hereditary algebra of Euclidean type and TKQ is a post-

projective tilting KQ-module. We recall that every concealed algebra B of
Euclidean type is representation-infinite and the Auslander–Reiten quiver
Γ(mod B) of B has the shape

where mod B is the category of finite dimensional right B-modules, P(B) is

the unique postprojective component of Γ(mod B) containing all the inde-
composable projective B-modules, Q(B) is the unique preinjective compo-
nent of Γ(mod B) containing all the indecomposable injective B-modules,
and R(B) is the (non-empty) regular part consisting of the remaining com-
ponents of Γ(mod B). We recall also that:
• the regular part R(B) of the Auslander–Reiten quiver Γ(mod B) is
a disjoint union of the P1 (K)-family
T B = {TλB }λ∈P1 (K)
of pairwise orthogonal standard stable tubes TλB , where P1 (K) is
the projective line over K,
• the family T B separates the postprojective component P(B) from
the preinjective component Q(B),
• the module category mod B is controlled by the Euler quadratic form
qB : K0 (B) −→ Z of the algebra B.

1
Another Random Scribd Document
with Unrelated Content
 Mr. Puddlebox in immense horror: "Done what?"

"Broken in there," and Mr. Wriford jerked back his head in "there's"
indication, and Mr. Puddlebox, to his new and frantic alarm, found that a
large house stood within fifty paces of them, they in its garden.

"Why, you're—hup!"—cried Mr. Puddlebox—"Blink! Why, what to the

devil do you mean—broken in there? What are we,—hup, blink!—doing
here?"

"Why, we had a bet," said Mr. Wriford, looking over his prizes and
clearly much pleased with himself. "I bet you as we came down the road
that I'd break in here before you would. I took the front and you went to the
back, but you've been asleep."

"Asleep!" cried Mr. Puddlebox. "I've been drunk. I was drunk." He got
on his knees from where he sat and with a furious action fumbled in his
coat-tails. From them his bottle of whisky, and Mr. Puddlebox furiously
wrenched the cork and hurled the bottle from him. "To hell with it!" cried
Mr. Puddlebox as it lay gurgling. "Hell take it. I'll not touch it again. Why,
loony—why, you staring, hup! hell! mad loony, if you'd been caught you'd
have gone to convict prison, boy. And my fault for this cursed drink. Give
me those things. Give them to me and get out of here—get up the road."

"Let 'em alone!" said Mr. Wriford menacingly. "What d'you want with
'em?"

Mr. Puddlebox played the game learnt of experience. He concealed his

agitation. He said with his jolly smile: "Why, mean that I will not be beat at
anything by you or by any man. I will challenge you or any man at any
game and will be beat by none. You've been in and got 'em, boy; now, curse
me, I will equal you and beat you for that I will go in and put them back.
Play fair, boy. Hand over."

"Well, there you are," said Mr. Wriford, disarmed and much tickled.

"Out you go then, boy," said Mr. Puddlebox, gathering up the trinkets.
"Out into the road. You had none of me to interfere with you, and I must
have none of you while I go my own way to this."

Mr. Puddlebox took Mr. Wriford to the gate of the grounds, then went
back again in much trembling. An open window informed him of Mr.
Wriford's place of entry. He leant through to a sofa that stood handy, there
deposited the trinkets, and very softly shut the window down. When he
rejoined Mr. Wriford, fear's perspiration was streaming from him. "I've had
a squeak of it," said Mr. Puddlebox with simulated cheeriness. "Let's out of
this, and I'll tell you."

He walked Mr. Wriford long, quickly and far. While he walked he fought
again the battle that had been swift victory when he cast his bottle from
him; and in future days fought it again and met new tortures in each fight.

"Aren't you going to get any whisky?" asked Mr. Wriford when on a day,
pockets lined with harvest money, he noticed Mr. Puddlebox's abstinence.

"Whisky! Hell take such stinking stuff," cried Mr. Puddlebox and sucked
in his cheeks—and groaned; then put a hand in his tail-pocket and felt a
hard lump rolled in a cloth that lay where the whisky used to lie and said to
himself: "Two bottles—two bottles."

It was Mr. Puddlebox's promise to himself, and his lustiest weapon in his
battles with his desire, that, on some day that must come somehow, the day
when he should be relieved of his charge of Mr. Wriford, he would buy
himself two bottles of whisky and sit himself down and drink them. Into the
hard lump rolled in the cloth, and composing it, there went daily when his
earnings permitted it two coppers. When that sum reached eighty-four—two
at three-and-six apiece—his two bottles would be ready for the mere
asking.

Wherefore "Two bottles! Two bottles!" Mr. Puddlebox would assure

himself when most fiercely his cravings assailed him, and against the pangs
of his denial would combine luxurious thoughts of when they should thus
be slaked and fears of what might happen to his loony if he now gave way
to them.
 Much those fears—or the affection whence they rose—cost him in these
later days: swiftly their end approached. Much and more as summer passed
and autumn came sombrely and chill: swiftly their end as sombre day
succeeded sombre day, and they passed down into Cornwall and went along
the sombre sea. Village to village, through nature in decay that grey sky
shrouded, grey sea dirged: Mr. Puddlebox ever for tarrying when larger
town was reached, Mr. Wriford ever for onward—onward, on.

CHAPTER II

CROSS WORK

Ever for onward, Mr. Wriford—onward, onward, on!

Where, in the bright days, Mr. Puddlebox had taken the lead and
suggested their road and programme, now, in the sombre days, chill in the
air, and in the wind a bluster, Mr. Wriford led. He chose the roughest paths.
He most preferred the cliff tracks where wind and rain drove strongest, or
down upon the shingle where walking was mostly climbing the great
boulders that ran from cliff to sea. He walked with head up as though to
show the weather how he scorned it. He walked very fast as though there
was something he pursued.

Mr. Puddlebox did not like it at all. Much of Mr. Puddlebox's jolly
humour was shaken out of him in these rough and arduous scrambles, and
he grumbled loud and frequent. But very fond of his loony, Mr. Puddlebox,
and increasingly anxious for him in this fiercer mood of his.

There are limits, though: and these came on an afternoon wild and wet
when Mr. Wriford exchanged the cliff road for the shore and pressed his
way at his relentless pace along a desolate stretch cut into frequent inlets by
rocky barriers that must be toilsomely climbed, a dun sea roaring at them.
 "Why, what to the devil is it you're chasing, boy?" Mr. Puddlebox's
grumblings at last broke out, when yet another barrier surmounted revealed
another and a steeper little beyond. "Here's a warm town we've left," cried
Mr. Puddlebox, sinking upon a great stone, "and here's as wet, cold, and
infernal a climbing as I challenge you or any man ever to have seen. Here's
you been dragging and trailing and ripe for anything these three months and
more, and now rushing and stopping for nothing so I challenge the devil
himself to keep up with you."

"Well, don't keep up!" said Mr. Wriford fiercely. "Who wants you to?"

Mr. Puddlebox blinked at that; but he answered stoutly: "Well, curse me

if I do, for one."

"Nor me for another," said Mr. Wriford and turned where he stood and
pressed on across the shingle towards the next rocky arm.

Mr. Puddlebox sucked in his cheeks, felt at the hard lump in his pocket,
then followed at a little run, and caught Mr. Wriford as Mr. Wriford climbed
the further barrier of rocks.

"Hey, give us a hand, boy," cried Mr. Puddlebox cheerfully. "This is a

steep one."

Mr. Wriford looked down. "What, are you coming on? I thought you'd
stopped."

"You're unkind, boy," said Mr. Puddlebox.

Mr. Wriford, looking down, this time saw the blink that went with the
words. He jumped back lower, coming with reckless bounds. "I'm sorry," he
said. "I'm sorry. Look here, coming across this bit"—he pointed back to
their earlier stopping-place—"I felt—I felt rotten to think you'd gone."

"Why, that's my loony!" cried Mr. Puddlebox, highly pleased. "Come

down here, boy. Let's talk of this business."
 "But I wouldn't look back," said Mr. Wriford, "or come back. I've done
with that sort of thing."

"Why, so you have," said Mr. Puddlebox, rightly guessing to what Mr.
Wriford referred. "You can come down now, though, for I'm asking you to,
so there's no weakness in that. There's shelter here."

"I don't want shelter," said Mr. Wriford, and went a step higher and stood
with head and back erect where gale and rain caught him more full.

Mr. Puddlebox summoned much impressiveness into his voice. "Boy,"

said Mr. Puddlebox, "this is a fool's game, and I never saw such even with
you. Bring sense to it, boy. Tramping is well enough for fine days: winters
for towns. There's money to be found in towns, boy; and if no money,
workhouse is none so bad, and when we've tried it you've liked it and called
it something new, which is what you want. Well, there's nothing new this
way, boy. There's no work and there's no bed in the fields winter-time.
Nothing new this way, boy."

A fiercer drive of wind spun Mr. Wriford where he stood exposed. He

caught at a rock with his hands and laughed grimly, then stood erect again,
and pressed himself against the rising gale.

"Ah, isn't there, though?" he cried. "Man, there's cold and rain and wind,
and there's tramping on and on against it and feeling you don't care a damn
for it."

"Well, curse me, but I do," returned Mr. Puddlebox. "It's just what I do
mind, and there's no sense to it, boy. There's no sense to it."

"There is for me," Mr. Wriford cried. "It's what I want!" He turned from
fronting the gale. Mr. Puddlebox saw him measuring with his eye the height
where he stood from the ground, and called in swift alarm: "Don't jump!
You'll break your legs. Don't—"

Mr. Wriford laughed aloud, jumped and came crashing to his hands and
knees, got up and laughed again. "That's all right!" said he.
 "Boy, that's all wrong," said Mr. Puddlebox very seriously. "That's all of
a part with your rushing along as if it was the devil himself you chased; and
what to the devil else it can be I challenge you to say or any man."

Mr. Wriford took up the words he had cried down from the top of the
barrier. "It's what I want," he told Mr. Puddlebox. "Cold and not minding it,
and fighting against the wind and not minding it, and getting wet and going
on full speed however rough the road and not minding that. Cold and wind
and rain and sticking to it and fighting it and beating it and liking it—ah!"
and he threw up his arms, extending them, and filled his chest with a great
breath, as though he embraced and drunk deep of the elements that he stuck
to and fought and beat.

Mr. Puddlebox looked at him closely. "Sure you're liking it?" he asked,
his tone the same as when he often inquired: "Sure you're happy, boy?"

"Sure! Why, of course I'm sure. Why, all the time I'm thrashing along, do
you know what I'm saying? I'm saying: 'Beating you! Beating you! Beating
you!' and at night I lie awake and think of it all waiting outside for me and
how I shall beat it, beat it, beat it again when morning comes."

"Sit down," said Mr. Puddlebox. "I've something to say to you."

"No, I'll stand," said Mr. Wriford.

"Aren't you tired?"

"I'm fit to drop," said Mr. Wriford; and then with a hard face: "But sitting
down is giving way to it. I'll not do that. No, by God, I'll beat it all the
time."

Then Mr. Puddlebox broke out in exasperation and struck his stick upon
the shingle to mark it. "Why, curse me if I ever heard such a thing or knew
such a thing!" cried Mr. Puddlebox. "Beating it! I've told you a score time,
and this time I give it to you hot, that when you go so, you're spooked,
spooked to hell and never will be unspooked! 'Beating it, beating it, beating
it!' you cry as you rush along! Why, it's then that it is beating you all the
time, for it is of yourself that you are thinking. And that's what's wrong with
you, thinking of yourself, and has always been. And there's no being happy
that way and never will be. Think of some one else, boy. For God
Almighty's sake think of some one else or you're beat and mad for sure!"

Mr. Wriford gave him back his fierceness. "Think of some one else!
That's what I've done all my life. That's what locked me up and did for me.
I've done with all that now, and I'm happy. Think of some one else! God!"
cried he and snapped his fingers. "I don't care that for anybody. Whom
should I think of?"

"Well, try a thought for me," cried Mr. Puddlebox, relenting nothing of
his own heat. "I've watched you these four months. I've got you out of
trouble. Curse me, I've fed you and handled you like a baby. But for me
you'd like be lying dead somewhere."

"Well, who cares?" cried Mr. Wriford. "Not me, I don't."

"Ah, and you'd liker still be clapped in an asylum and locked there all
your days; you'd mind that. But for me that's where you'd be and where
you'll go, if I left you to-morrow."

Mr. Wriford cried with a black and angry face: "Well, if it's true, who
asked you to hang on to me? Why have you done it? If it's true, mind you!
For I've done my share. You've admitted that yourself. In the rows we've got
into I've done my share, and in the work we've done I've done more than my
share, once I've learnt the hang of it. Now then! That's true, isn't it? If
you've done so jolly much, why have you? There's one for you. Why?"

His violent storming put a new mood to Mr. Puddlebox's face. Not the
exasperation with which he had burst out and continued till now. That left
him. Not the jolly grin with which commonly he regarded life in general
and Mr. Wriford in particular. None of these. A new mood. The mood and
hue Mr. Wriford had glimpsed when, looking down from the barrier as Mr.
Puddlebox overtook him, and crying down to him: "I thought you'd
stopped," he had seen Mr. Puddlebox blink and heard him say: "You're
unkind, boy." Now he saw it again—and was again to see it before
approaching night gave way to following morn.
 Mr. Puddlebox blinked and went redly cloudy in the face. "Why?" said
he. "Well, I'll tell you why, boy. Because I like you. I liked you, boy, when
you came wretched up the Barnet road and thought there was one with you,
following you. I liked you then for you were glad of my food and my help
and caught at my hand as night fell and held it while you slept. Curse me, I
liked you then, for, curse me, you were the first come my way in many
years of sin that thought me stronger than himself and that I could be
stronger to and could help. I liked you then, boy, and I've liked you more
each sun and moon since. I've lost a precious lot in life through being what,
curse me, I am. None ever to welcome me, none ever to be glad of me, none
ever that minded if I rode by on my legs or went legs first in a coffin cart.
Then came you that was loony, that was glad of me here and glad of me
there, that asked me this and asked me that, that laughed with me and ate
with me and slept with me, that because you was loony was weaker than
me. So I liked you, boy; curse me, I loved you, boy. There's why for you."

This long speech, delivered with much blinking and redness of the face,
was listened to by Mr. Wriford with the fierceness gone out of his eyes but
with his face twisting and working as though what he heard put him in
difficulty. In difficulty and with difficulty he then broke out. "God knows
I'm grateful," Mr. Wriford said, his voice strained as his face. "But look at
this—I don't want to be grateful. I don't want that kind of thing. I've been
through all that. 'Thank you' for this; and 'Thank you' for that; and 'I beg
your pardon;' and 'Oh, how kind of you.' Man, man!" cried Mr. Wriford,
striking his hands to his face and tearing them away again as though scenes
were before his eyes that he would wrench away. "Man, I've done that thirty
years and been killed of it. I don't want ever to think that kind of stuff again.
I want just to keep going on and having nothing touch me except what hurts
me here in my body and not care a damn for it—which I don't. You're
always asking me if I'm happy, and I know you think I'm not. But I am.
Look how hard my hands are: that makes me happy just to think of that.
And how I don't mind getting wet or cold: that makes me happy, so happy
that I shout out with the gladness of it and get myself wetter. It's being a
man. It's getting the better of myself. You're going to say it's not. But you
don't understand. One man has to get the better of himself one way and one
another. With me it's getting the better of being afraid of things. Well, I'm
beating it. I'm beating it when I'm out here, tramping along. But when I'm
sheltering it's beating me. When you tell me—" He stopped, and stooping to
Mr. Puddlebox took his hands and squeezed them so that the water was
squeezed to Mr. Puddlebox's eyes. "There!" cried Mr. Wriford. "Grateful!
I'm more grateful to you. I'm fonder of you than any man I've ever met. But
don't tell me you're fond of me. I don't want that from anybody. When you
tell me that it puts me back to what I used to be. I'm grateful. Believe that;
but don't make me talk about it."

"I never did want you to," said Mr. Puddlebox. "Look here, boy. Look
how we begun on this talk. I told you to think of some one else, care for
some one else, and you broke out 'whom were you to care for?' and I gave
you, being cold and wet and mortal tired, I gave you 'For God Almighty's
sake care for me' and then told you why you should. Well, let's get back to
that. Care for me. Look here, boy. We were ten mile to the next village
along this devil of a place when we left the town. I reckon we've come four,
and here's evening upon us and six to go. Well, I can't go them, and that's
the end and the beginning of it. I'm for going back where there's a bed to be
had and while yet it is to be had, for they sleep early these parts. Wherefore
when I say 'for God Almighty's sake care for me,' I mean stop this chasing
this way and let's chase back the way we come. We'll forget what's gone
between us," concluded Mr. Puddlebox, reverting to his jolly smiles and
getting to his feet, "and I'll hate you and you'll hate me, since that pleases
you most, and back we'll get and have a dish of potatoes inside of us and a
warm bed outside. Wherefore I say:

"O ye food and warmth, bless ye the Lord: praise Him and magnify Him
for ever."

Mr. Wriford laughed, and Mr. Puddlebox guessed him persuaded once
again. But he set his face then and shook his head sharply, and Mr.
Puddlebox saw him determined. "No," said Mr. Wriford. "No, I'm not going
back. I'm never going back. If you want to know what I'm going to do, I'm
going to stay the night out here."

Mr. Puddlebox cried: "Out here! Now what to the devil—"

"I'd settled it," Mr. Wriford interrupted him. "I'd settled it when I thought
you'd gone back. There're little caves all along here—I saw one the other
side of these rocks. I'm going to sleep in one. I'd made up my mind when
you caught up with me. I'm going to do it."

Mr. Puddlebox stared at him, incapable of speech. Then cried: "Wet as

you are?"

"Wet as I am," said Mr. Wriford and laughed.

"Cold as it is and going to be colder?"

"Cold as it is and the colder the better."

"You'll stay alone," cried Mr. Puddlebox. "Curse me if I'll stay with
you."

"You needn't," said Mr. Wriford. "I'm not asking you to."

"But you think I'm going to," cried Mr. Puddlebox. "And you're wrong,
for I'm not. I'm going straight back, and I'm going at once, the quicker to
fetch you to your senses. I'm going, boy;" and in advertisement of his
intention Mr. Puddlebox began resolutely to move away.

Mr. Wriford as resolutely turned to the barrier of rocks and began to

climb.

"Come on, boy," called Mr. Puddlebox.

Mr. Wriford called back: "No. No, I'm going to stay. I'm going to see the
night through."

"You'll know where to find me," cried Mr. Puddlebox. "I'll be where we
lay last night."

Mr. Wriford's laugh came to him through the gathering gloom, and
through the gloom he saw Mr. Wriford's form midway up the rocks. "And
you'll know where to find me," Mr. Wriford called.

Mr. Puddlebox paused irresolutely and cursed roundly where he paused.

Then turned and stamped away across the shingle. When he reached the
rocky arm where first they had quarrelled he stopped again and again
looked back. Mr. Wriford was not to be seen.

"That'll go near to kill him if he stays," said Mr. Puddlebox. "And, curse
me, if I go back to him he will stay. I'll push on, and he'll follow me. That's
the only way to it."

They had spent the previous night in an eating-house where "Beds for
Single Men—4d." attracted wanderers. It was seven o'clock when Mr.
Puddlebox's slow progression—halting at every few yards and looking back
—at length returned him to it. He dried and warmed himself before the fire
in the kitchen that was free to inmates of the house.

"Where's your mate?" asked the proprietor. "Thought you was making
Port Rannock?"

"Too far," said Mr. Puddlebox; and to the earlier question: "He's behind
me. I'll wait my supper till he comes."

He waited, though very hungry. Every time the door of the kitchen
opened he turned eagerly in expectation that was every time denied.
Towards nine he gave up the comfortable seat he had secured before the
blaze and sat himself where he could watch the door. It never admitted Mr.
Wriford.

"What's the night?" he asked a seafaring newcomer.

"Blowing up," the man told him. "Blowing up dirty."

Mr. Puddlebox went from the room and from the house, shivered as the
night air struck him, and then down the cobbled street. Ten o'clock, borne
gustily upon the wind, came to him from the church tower as he turned
along the shore.

None saw him go: and he was not to return.

 CHAPTER III

WATER THAT TAKES YOUR BREATH

Mr. Puddlebox's landsman's eye showed him no signs of that "blowing

up dirty" of which he had been informed. A fresh breeze faced him as he
walked and somewhat hindered his progress; but a strong moon rode high
and lighted him; the sea, much advanced since he came that way, broke
quietly along the shore. "Why, it's none so bad a night to be out," thought
Mr. Puddlebox; and there began to change within him the mood in which he
had left the lodging-house. Seated there he had imagined a rough night, wet
and dark, and with each passing hour had the more reproached himself for
his desertion of his loony. Now that he found night clear and still, well-lit
and nothing overcold, he inclined towards considering himself a fool for his
pains.

An hour on his road brought change of mood again. The very stillness,
the very clearness that first had reassured him, now began to frighten him.
He began to apprehend as it were a something sinister in the quietude. He
began to dislike the persistent regularity of his footsteps grinding in the
deep shingle and to dislike yet more the persistent regularity of the breaking
waves. They rose about knee-high as he watched them, fell and pressed
whitely up the beach, back slowly, as though reluctant and with deep protest
of the stones, then massed knee-high and down and up again. Darkly on his
right hand the steep cliffs towered.

The monotony of sound oppressed him. He began to have an eerie

feeling as though he were being followed, and once or twice he looked
back. No, very much alone. Then his footsteps, whose persistent regularity
had wrought upon his senses, began to trouble him with their noisiness
upon the shingle. He tried to walk less heavily and presently found himself
picking his way, and that added to the eeriness, startling him when the loose
stones yielded and he stumbled.
 He approached that quarter where the shore began to be divided by the
rocky barriers that ran from cliff to sea. Then he apprehended what, as he
expressed it to himself, was the matter with the sea. It was very full. It
looked very deep. What had seemed to him to be waves rolling up now
appeared to him as a kind of overflowing, as though not spurned-out waves,
but the whole volume of the water welled, swelled, to find more room. The
breaking sound was now scarcely to be heard, and that intensified the
stillness, and that frightened him more. He began to run....

Mr. Puddlebox stopped running for want of breath; but that physical
admission of the mounting panic within him left him very frightened
indeed. He went close to the cliffs. Darker there and very shut-up the way
they towered so straight and so high. He came away from them, his senses
worse wrought upon. Then he came to the first of the rocky barriers that ran
like piers from the cliff to the sea, and then for the first time noticed how
high the tide had risen. When he came here with Mr. Wriford they had done
their climbing far from the cliff's base. Now the barrier was in great part
submerged. He must climb it near to the cliff where climbing was steeper
and more difficult. Well, there was sand between these barriers, that was
one good thing. Walking would be easier and none of that cursed noise that
his feet made on the shingle. With much difficulty he got up and looked
down upon the other side....

There wasn't any sand. Water where sand had been—water that with that
welling, swelling motion pressed about the shingle that banked beneath the
cliff.

Mr. Puddlebox said aloud, in a whisper: "The tide!" It was the first time
since he had started out that he had thought of it. He looked along the cliff.
From where he stood, from where these rocky piers began, the cliff, as he
saw, began to stand outwards in a long bluff. The further one went, the
further the tide would.... He carried his eyes a little to sea. Beneath the
moon were white, uneasy lines. That was where the sea swirled upon the
barriers. He looked downwards and saw the placid water welling, swelling
beneath his feet.

"The tide," said Mr. Puddlebox again, again in a whisper. He swallowed

something that rose in his throat. He ran his tongue around his lips, for they
were dry. He shivered, for the perspiration his long walk had induced now
seemed to be running down his body in very cold drops. He looked straight
above him and at once down to his feet again and moved his feet in
steadying of his balance: a sense of giddiness came from looking up that
towering height that towered so steeply as to appear hanging over him. He
looked along the way he had come; and he stood so close to the cliff-face,
and it bulked so enormously before him, that the bay he had traversed
seemed, by contrast, to sweep back immensely far—immensely safe.

Mr. Puddlebox watched that safety with unmoving eyes as though he

were fascinated by it. The longer he watched the more it seemed to draw
him. He kept his eyes upon one distant spot, half way along the bay and
high up the shore, and his hypnotic state presented him to himself sitting
there—safe. Still with his eyes upon it he moved across the narrow pier in
its direction and sat down, legs dangling towards the bay, in the first action
of descending. He twisted about to pursue the action, for he was a timid and
unhandy climber who would climb downwards facing his hold. As he came
to his hands and knees he went forward on them and looked across the fifty
yards of shingle-bank, the sea close up, that separated him from the next
pier of rocks. He was a creature of fear as he knelt there—a very figure of
very ugly fear, ungainly in his form that hung bulkily between his arms and
legs, white and loosely fat in his face that peered timorously over the edge,
cowardly and useless in his crouching, shrinking pose.

He said aloud, his eyes on the distant barrier: "I'm as safe there—for a
peep—as I am here. I can get back. Even if I get wet I can get back."

He shuffled forward and this time put his legs over the other side and sat
a while. Here the drop was not more than three feet beneath the soles of his
boots as they dangled. He drew them up. "If he's safe, he's safe," said Mr.
Puddlebox. "And if he's drowned, he's drowned. Where's the sense of—"

Something that floated in the water caught his eye. A little, round,
greyish clump. About the size of a face. Floating close to the shore. Not a
face. A clump of fishing-net corks that Mr. Puddlebox remembered to have
seen dry upon the sand when first he arrived here. But very like, very
dreadfully like a face, and the water rippling very dreadfully over it at each
pulsing of the tide. Floated his loony's face somewhere like that? Struggled
he somewhere near to shore as that? The ripples awash upon his mouth? His
eyes staring? Mouth that had laughed with Mr. Puddlebox these several
months? Eyes that often in appeal had sought his own, and that he loved to
light from fear to peace, to trust, to confidence, to merriment? Floated he
somewhere? Struggled he somewhere? Waited he somewhere for these
hands which, when he sometimes caught, proved them at last of use to some
one, stronger than some one else's in many years of sin?

Mr. Puddlebox slid to the shingle and ran along it; came to the further
barrier and got upon it; stood there in fear. Beyond, and to the next pier,
there was no more, between sea and cliff, than room to walk.

His lips had been very dry when, a short space before, looking towards
where now he stood, he had run his tongue around them. They were moist
then to what, licking them again, his tongue now felt. Cold the sweat then
that trickled down his body: warm to what icy stream fear now exuded on
his flesh. He had shivered then: now he not shivered but in all his frame
shook so that his knees scarcely could support him. Then it was merely
safety that he desired: now he realised fear. Then only safety occupied his
mind: now cowardice within him, and he knew it. Love, strangely, strongly
conceived in these months, called him on: fear, like a live thing on the rock
before him, held him, pressed him back. He thought of rippling water awash
upon that mouth, and looked along the narrow path before him, and licked
his arid lips again: he saw himself with that deep water, that icy water, that
thick water, welling, swelling, to his knees, to his waist, to his neck,
sucking him adrift—ah! and he looked back whence he had come and ran
his tongue again about his ugly, hanging mouth.

"I'm a coward," said Mr. Puddlebox aloud. "I can't come to you, boy," he
said. "I've got to go back, boy," he said. "I can't stand the water, boy. I've
always been terrified of deep water, boy. I'd come to you through fire, boy;
by God, I would. Not through water. I'm a coward. I can't help it, boy. Water
takes your breath. I can't do it, boy."

He waited as if he thought an answer would come. There was only an

intense stillness. There was only the very tiniest lapping of the water as it
welled and swelled: sometimes there was the faint rattle of a stone that the
sucking water sucked from the little ridge of pebbles against the cliff.
 Mr. Puddlebox looked down upon the water and spoke to it. The words
he spoke might have been employed fiercely, but he spoke them scarcely
above a whisper as though it were a confidence that he invited of the sea.
"Why don't you break and roar?" said Mr. Puddlebox to the sea, bending
down to it. "Why don't you break and roar in waves with foam? You'd be
more like fire then. There'd be something in you then. It's the dead look of
you. It's the thick look of you. Why don't you break and roar? It's the
swelling up from under of you. It's the sucking of you. Why don't you break
and roar?"

No answer to that. Only the aching stillness. Only the very tiniest, tiniest
lapping of the water as it welled and swelled: sometimes the tiny rattle of a
stone that from the ridge against the cliff the sucking water sucked.

In that silence Mr. Puddlebox continued to stare at the water. He stared at

it; and at its silence, and as he stared, and as silent, motionless, he continued
to stare, his face began to work as, in the presence of a sleeper, sudden
stealthy resolve might come to one that watched. Then he began to act as
though the water were in fact asleep. He looked all round, then he stepped
swiftly down to the little ridge. The pebbles gave beneath him and carried
his left foot into the water. He stood perfectly still, pressed against the cliff.
"Why don't you break and roar?" whispered Mr. Puddlebox. No answer. No
sound. He began to tread very cautiously towards the further pier, the palms
of his hands against the cliff, and his face anxiously towards the sea, and all
his action as though he moved in stealth and thought to give the sea the slip.
As he neared the barrier, so neared the cliff the sea. When but twenty yards
remained to be traversed the cliff began to thrust a buttress seaward, awash
along its base. "Water takes your breath," Mr. Puddlebox had said. A dozen
steps took him above his boots, and he began to catch at his breath as the
chill struck him. He opened his mouth with the intent to make these sobbing
inspirations less noisy than if drawn hissing through his teeth. He slid his
feet as if to lift and splash them would risk awakening the sleeping tide. He
was to his knees in it when he reached the rocks. Their surface was green in
slimy weed: that meant the tide would cover them. He got up, and on his
hands and knees upon the slime caught at his breath and peered beyond.

No beach was visible here: only water: perfectly still.

 It was a very short way to the next barrier, and of the barrier very short
what was to be seen. The buttress of the cliff pressed steadily out to what
was no more than a little table of rock, scarcely thicker above the surface
than the thickness of a table-top, then seemed to fall away. A trifle beyond
the table there upstood a detached pile of rock, rather like a pulpit and
standing about a pulpit's height above the water. That table—when it ran far
out along the shore—was where Mr. Puddlebox, looking back, had last seen
his loony stand. He remembered it, for he remembered the summit of the
pulpit rock that peered above it.

The idea to shout occurred to him. That low table seemed to mark a
corner. His loony might be beyond it. If he shouted— He did not dare to
shout. Here, more than before, the intensity of the silence possessed him.
He did not dare to break it. Here, with no beach visible, the water seemed
profoundly dead in slumber.

"Why don't you break and roar?" said Mr. Puddlebox. "Why don't you
—" he held his breath and crept forward. He lowered himself and caught his
breath. His feet crunched upon the shingle bed, the water stood above his
knees, and while the stones still moved where he had disturbed them he
stood perfectly still. When they had settled he began to move, sideways,
very slowly, his back against the cliff. Each sidelong step took him deeper;
at each he more sharply caught his breath. It seemed to him as though the
cliff were actually pressing him forward with huge hands. He pressed
against it with all his force as though to hold it back. It thrust him, thrust
him, thrust him. He was deep to his thighs. He was deep to his waist.
"Water takes your breath," Mr. Puddlebox had said. At each deepening step
more violently his breath seemed to be taken, more clutchingly had to be
recalled. He was above his waist. He stumbled and gave a cry and
recovered himself and began to go back; tried to control his dreadful
breathing; came on again; then again retreated. Now his breathing that had
been sobbing gasps became sheer sobs. He suddenly turned from his
sidelong progress, went backwards in two splashing strides whence he had
come—in three, in four, and then in a panic headlong rush, and as if he
were pursued clambered frantically out again upon the slimy rocks.
 As if he were pursued—and now, as if to sight the pursuit, looked
sobbing back upon the water he had churned. There was scarcely a sign of
his churning. Scarcely a mark of his track. Still as before the water lay
there. Still, and thick, and silent, and asleep, and seemed to mock his fears.

"Blast you!" cried Mr. Puddlebox, responsive to the silent mock. "Blast
you, why don't you break and roar?" He put a foot down to it and glared at
the water. "Why in hell don't you break and roar?" cried Mr. Puddlebox, and
flung himself in again, and splashed to the point at which he had turned and
fled, and drew a deep breath and went forward above his waist....

The cliff thrust him out and he was deeper; thrust again, and he was
above his waist. "Takes your breath"—he was catching at his breath in
immense spasms. The shore dropped beneath his feet and he was to his
armpits, the table of rock a long pace away. He was drawn from the cliff,
and he screamed in dreadful fear. He tried to go back and floundered
deeper. He was drowning, he knew. If he lost his footing—and he was
losing it—he would go down, and if he went down he never would rise
again. He called aloud on God and screamed aloud in wordless terror. The
tide swung him against the cliff and drew him screaming and clutching
along it. He stumbled and knew himself gone. His hands struck the table of
rock. He clutched, found his feet, sprang frantically, and drew himself upon
it. He lay there exhausted and moaning. When his abject mind was able to
give words to his moans, "O my Christ, don't let me drown," he said. "Not
after that, Christ, don't let me drown. O merciful Christ, not after that."

After a little he opened his eyes that had been shut in bewilderment of
blind terror and in preparation of death and that he had not courage or
thought to open. He opened his eyes. This is what he saw.

Beneath his chin, as he lay, the still, deep water. Close upon his right
hand the cliff that towered upwards to the night. A narrow channel away
from him stood the pulpit rock. The cliff ran sharply back from beside him,
then thrust again towards the pulpit; stopped short of it and then pressed
onwards out to sea. Its backward dip formed a tiny inlet over which,
masking it from the open sea, the pulpit rock stood sentinel. The back of the
inlet showed at its centre a small cave that had the appearance of a human
mouth, open. At low water this mouth would have stood a tall man's height
above the beach. A short ridge ran along its upper lip. In the dim light it
showed there blackly like a little clump of moustache. From its under lip,
forming a narrow slipway of beach up to it, there ran a rubble of stones as if
the mouth had emitted them or as if its tongue depended into the sea. The
corners of the mouth drooped, and here, as if they slobbered, the water
trickled in and out responsive to the heaving of the tide.

Mr. Wriford lay upon this slip. He lay face downwards. His arms from
his elbows were extended within the mouth of the cave. His boots were in
the water. His legs, as Mr. Puddlebox thought, lay oddly twisted.

CHAPTER IV

WATER THAT SWELLS AND SUCKS

Who is so vile a coward that one weaker than himself, in worse distress,
shall not arrest his cowardice? Who that has given love so lost in fear as not
to love anew, amain, when out of peril his love is called? Who so base then
not to lose in gladness what held his soul in dread?

First Mr. Puddlebox only stared. Water that takes your breath had taken
his. Water that takes your breath rose in a thin film over the rock where on
his face he lay, passed beneath his body, chilled him anew, and took his
breath again. He watched it ooze from under him and spread before him: lip
upwards where he faced it and ooze beneath his hands. Then gave his eyes
again towards the cave.

Who is so vile a coward? Mr. Puddlebox's teeth chattered with his body's
frozen chill: worse, worse, with terror of what he had escaped—God, when
that sucking water sucked!—fast, faster with that worse horror he besought
heaven "not after that" should overtake him. Who so vile, so base? Ah, then
that piteous thing that lay before his eyes! in shape so odd, so ugly—
broken? dead? Whom he had seen so wild, so eager? who child had been to
him and treated as a child? Who first and only in all these years of sin had
looked to him for aid, for counsel, strength? Who must have fought this
filthy, cruel, silent, sucking water, and fighting it have called him, wanted
him? Ah!

Who is so vile? "Loony," Mr. Puddlebox whispered. "Loony! Hey, boy!"

He only whispered. He did not dare a cry that should demand an answer
—and demanding, no answer bring. "Hey, boy! Loony!" He tried to raise
his voice. He dared not raise it. Anew and thicker now the water filmed the
rock about him. Here was death: well, there was death—that piteous
thing....

Then change! Then out of death life! Then gladness out of dread! Then
joy's tumult as one beside a form beneath a sheet should see the dead loved
move.

About the slipway, as he watched, he saw the swelling water, as if with

sudden impulse, swell over Mr. Wriford's boots, run to his knees, and in
response the prone figure move—the shoulders raise as if to drag the body:
raise very feebly and very feebly drop as if the oddly twisted legs were
chained.

Feebly—ah, but in sign of life! Revulsion from fear to gladness brought

Mr. Puddlebox scrambling to his feet and upright upon them. To a loud cry
there would be answer then! Loudly he challenged it. "Loony!" cried Mr.
Puddlebox, his voice athrill. "Hey, boy, what's wrong? I'm coming to you,
boy!"

It was a groan that answered him.

"Are you hurt, boy?"

There answered him: "Oh, for God's sake—oh, for God's sake!"

"Why, that's my loony!" cried Mr. Puddlebox in a very loud voice. "Hold
on, boy! I'm coming to you!"
 Excitedly, in excited gladness his terrors bound up, quickly as he could,
catching at his breath as his fears caught him, stifling them in jolly shouts
of: "Hold on for me, boy! Why, here I come, boy, this very minute!" he
started to make his way, excitedly pursued it.

"Hold on for me, boy!" The cliff along the wall of the inlet against which
he stood shelved downwards into the dark, still sea. "Here I come, boy!" He
went on his face on the table rock and with his legs felt in the water beneath
him and behind him. "Hold on for me, boy!" His feet found a ridge, and he
lowered himself to it and began to feel his way along it, his hands against
the cliff, above his waist the still, dark sea. "Here I come, boy! This very
minute!"

So he cried: so he came—deeper, and now his perils rose to fight what

brought him on. Deeper—the water took his breath. "Here I come, boy!"
Stumbled—thought himself gone, knew as it were an icy hand thrust in his
vitals from the depths, clutching his very heart. "I'm to you now, boy. Here
—" Terror burst in a cry to his mouth. He changed it to "Whoa!" He was
brought by the ridge on which he walked to a point opposite what of the
slipway before the cave stood dry. The ridge ended abruptly. He had almost
gone beyond it, almost slipped and gone, almost screamed.

"Whoa!" said Mr. Puddlebox. "Hold on for me, boy!" He took his hands
from the cliff and faced about where Mr. Wriford lay. Shaken, he felt his
way lower. God, again! Again his foothold terminated! Abruptly he could
feel his way no more. Like a hand, like a hand at his throat, the water
caught his breath. "Hold on for me, boy!" His voice was thick. "Hold on for
me, boy!" Clear again, but he stood, stood, and where he stood the water
swayed him. Here the cliff base seemed to drop. Here the depths waited
him. Facing his feet he knew must be the wall of the slipway. No more than
a long stride—ah, no more! If he launched himself and threw himself, his
foot must strike it, his arms come upon its surface where that figure lay.
Only a long stride. What, when he made it, if no foothold offered? What if
he missed, clutched, fell? He looked across the narrow space. Only that
spring's distance that figure lay, its face turned from him. He listened. The
silence ached, tingled all about him. Suddenly it gave him from the figure
the sound of breathing that came and went in moans.
 Who is so vile a coward? Swiftly Mr. Puddlebox crouched, nerved,
braced himself to spring. Ah, swifter thrust his mind, and bright as flame
and fierce as flame, as a flame shouting, flamed flaming vision before his
starting eyes. He saw himself leap. He saw himself clutch, falling—God, he
could feel his finger-nails rasp and split!—fallen, gone: rising to gulp and
scream, sinking to suffocate and gulp and writhe and rise and scream and
gulp and sink and go. Like flame, like flame, the vision leapt—upstreaming
from the water, shouting in his ears. Thrice he crouched to spring; thrice
like flame the vision thundered: thrice passed as flame that bursts before the
wind: thrice left him to the stillness, the sucking water, the sound of
moaning breath. A fourth time, a last time: ah, now was gone the very will
to bring himself to crouch!

He stood a moment, vacant, only trembling. His senses fluttered back to

him, and gone, so they informed him, something that before their flight had
occupied them. What? In his shaken state he was again a vacant space
searching for it before he realised. Then he knew. There was no sound of
breathing....

Trembling he listened for it, staring at the figure. Still; there was no
sound. Suddenly he heard it. Dreadfully it came. Feebly, a moaning
inspiration: stillness again—then a very little sigh, very gentle, very tiny,
and the prone figure quivered, relaxed.

Dead? Again, as on the table rock, afraid to call aloud, "Loony!" Mr.
Puddlebox whispered. "Hey, boy!"

No answer. Swelling about him came the creeping water, swayed him,
swelled and swayed again: high to his chest, higher now and moving him—
moving, sucking, drawing. Here was death: ah, well, wait a moment, for
there was death—that piteous thing face downwards there. He spoke softly:
"Hey, boy, are you gone?" The water rocked him. He cried brokenly, loudly:
"Loony! Are you gone, boy?"

Again, again, life out of death, joy's tumult out of fear!

He saw Mr. Wriford draw down his arms, press on his elbows, raise, then
turn towards him his face, most dreadfully grey, most dreadfully drawn in
pain.

Who so vile, so base?

Swift, swift revulsion to gladness out of dread. "Why, that's my loony!"

cried Mr. Puddlebox in a very loud voice.

Mr. Wriford said: "Have you come?"

"Why, here I am, boy!" He steadied his feet.

Very feebly, scarcely to be heard: "I don't see you."

"Why, there's no more than my nob to be seen, boy! I'm here to my nob
in the water." His feet were firm. He braced himself. "I'm to you, boy, and
I'm in the most plaguy place as I challenge any man ever to have been." He
crouched. "I've to jump, boy, and how to the devil—"

He launched himself. His foot struck the slipway bank—no hold!

Smooth rock, and his foot glanced down it! He had thought to spring
upward from what purchase his foot might find. It found none. Clutching as
he fell, he obtained no more than his arms upon the shingle of the slipway,
his chin upon it, his elbows thrusting deep, his fingers clutching in the
yielding stones.

"Loony!" Mr. Puddlebox cried. "Loony!"

He slipped further. He suddenly screamed: "Loony, I'm going! Christ,

I'm going!"

His face, in line with Mr. Wriford's, two arm's-lengths from it, was
dreadfully distorted, his lips wide, his teeth grinding. He choked between
them: "Can you help me, boy?"

Mr. Wriford was trying to help him. Mr. Wriford was working towards
him on his elbows, his face twisted in agony. As he came, "My legs are
broken," he said. "I'll reach you. I'll reach you."
 Eye to eye and dreadfully eyed they stared one upon the other. A foot's
breadth between them now, and now their fingers almost touching.

"I'm done, boy! Christ, I'm done!" But with the very cry, and with his
hand so near to Mr. Wriford's slipped again beyond it, Mr. Puddlebox had
sudden change of voice, sudden gleam in the eyes that had stood out in
horror. "Curse me, I'm not!" cried Mr. Puddlebox. "Curse me, I've bested it.
I've found a hole for my foot. Ease up, boy. I'm to you. By God, I'm to you
after all!"

Groan that was prayer of thanks came from Mr. Wriford. Fainting, his
head dropped forward on his hands. There was tremendous commotion in
the water as Mr. Puddlebox sprang up it from his foothold, thrashing it with
his legs as, chest upon the shingle, he struggled tremendously. Then he
drew himself out and on his knees, dripping, and bent over Mr. Wriford.

"I'm to you now, boy! You're all right now. Boy, you're all right now."

The swelling water swelled with new impulse up the shingle, washed
him where he knelt, ran beneath Mr. Wriford's face, and trickled in the
stones beyond it.

Mr. Puddlebox looked back upon it over his shoulder. He could not see
the table rock where he had lain. Only the pulpit rock upstood, and deep
and black the channel on either hand between it and the walls of their inlet.
He looked within the cave mouth before him and could see its inner face. It
was no more than a shallow hollowing by the sea. He looked upwards and
saw the cliff towering into the night, overhanging as it mounted.

He passed his tongue about his lips.

CHAPTER V
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