them out. There they
are!"

There they were, true enough, halfway up the water stairs, ready for my
hand, because of Betty's quickness.

In less than ten seconds I was at the top of the stairs again, and within
twenty seconds more we had battered down the door with our heavy ash
oars. In the king's closet we found Frances, surrounded by men at arms,
and the king crouching in a corner, barricaded by small pieces of
furniture.

George fired his pistol, and one of the six men fell, whereupon several
pistol shots were fired, filling the small room with powder smoke, but
injuring no one so far as we knew. De Grammont found an opening in
another man's armor, and four stood between us and Frances. Then the real
fight began--four against three. This would have been heavy odds in an
open field, but it was not so formidable in a small room almost dark with
smoke. Above all, the troopers were fighting for pay; we were fighting
for life.

The four men charged us fiercely, and while we were fighting just inside
the room, Frances worked her way from behind our antagonists toward the
battered door and was about to make her escape when one of the king's men
struck her a cowardly blow with the hilt of his sword, and she fell to
the floor at the head of the stairs.

"You and Hamilton take her to the boat," cried De Grammont, speaking to
me, but continuing to fence, as though by instinct. "I'll hold the door
till you call; then I'll run. The next best thing to fighting is
running."

I regretted the use of Hamilton's name, as it would betray his presence,
if overheard, which otherwise would not have been suspected, all of us
being well masked. But I had no time to waste in vain regrets, so George
and I lifted Frances from the floor and helped her down to the boat,
leaving De Grammont just outside the battered door, defending himself
nobly against four armed men and keeping them inside the king's closet.
He seemed to be enjoying himself, for he was laughing, bowing, parrying,
and thrusting, as though he were at a frolic rather than a fight. There
is but one people on earth in whose blood is mingled fire and ice--the
French.

When we reached the water, we found that the running tide had carried the
boat a short distance down-stream, but Bettina was standing on the stern
thwart, bending this way and that in her endeavor to scull back to the
landing by means of the steering oar. Every drop of blood in Bettina's
plump little body was