.

"Then take the consequences!"

Farnsworth lifted his sword, not to thrust, but to strike with its flat
side, and down it flashed with a noisy whack. Father Beret flung out an
arm and deftly turned the blow aside. It was done so easily that
Farnsworth sprang back glaring and surprised.

"You old fool!" he cried, leveling his weapon for a direct lunge. "You
devilish hypocrite!"

It was then that Father Beret turned deadly pale and swiftly crossed
himself. His face looked as if he saw something startling just beyond
his adversary. Possibly this sudden change of expression caused
Farnsworth to hesitate for a mere point of time. Then there was the
swish of a woman's skirts; a light step pattered on the frozen ground,
and Alice sprang between the men, facing Farnsworth. As she did this
something small and yellow,--the locket at her throat,--fell and rolled
under her feet. Nobody saw it.

In her hand she held an immense horse pistol, which she leveled in the
Captain's face, its flaring, bugle-shaped muzzle gaping not a yard from
his nose. The heavy tube was as steady as if in a vise.

"Drop that sword!"

That was all she said; but her finger was pressing the trigger, and the
flint in the backward slanting hammer was ready to click against the
steel. The leaden slugs were on the point of leaping forth.

"Drop that sword!"

The repetition seemed to close the opportunity for delay.

Farnsworth was on his guard in a twinkling. He set his jaw and uttered
an ugly oath; then quick as lightning he struck sidewise at the pistol
with his blade. It was a move which might have taken a less alert
person than Alice unawares; but her training in sword-play was ready in
her wrist and hand. An involuntary turn, the slightest imaginable, set
the heavy barrel of her weapon strongly against the blow, partly
stopping it, and then the gaping muzzle spat its load of balls and
slugs with a bellow that awoke the drowsy old village.

Farnsworth staggered backward, letting fall his sword. There was a rent
in the clothing of his left shoulder. He reeled; the blood spun out;
but he did not fall, although he grew white.

Alice stood gazing at him with a look on her face he would never
forget. It was a look that changed by wonderful swift gradations from
terrible hate to something like sweet pity. The instant she saw him
hurt and bleeding, his countenance relaxing and pale, her heart failed
her. She took a step toward him, her hand opened,