ine with the one
that opened upon the stairs, and by the latter he steered his backward
course. His aim was to gain the antechamber, although they guessed it
not, thinking that he did but retreat through inability to stand his
ground. His reasons were that here in this guardroom the best he could
do would be to put his back to the wall, where he might pick off one or
two before they made an end of him. The place was too bare to suit
his urgent, fearful need. Within the inner room there was furniture to
spare, with which he might contrive to hamper his opponents and give
them such a lusty fight as would live in the memory of those who might
survive it for as long as they should chance to live thereafter.

He had no thought of perishing himself, although, to any less concerned,
his death, sooner or later, must seem inevitable--the only possible
conclusion to this affray, taken as he was. His mind was concerned only
with this fight; his business to kill, and not himself to be slain. He
knew that presently others would come to support these three. Already,
perhaps, they were on their way, and he husbanded his strength against
their coming. He was proudly conscious of his own superior skill, for
he had studied the art of fence in Italy--its home--during his earlier
years, and there was no trick of sword-play with which he was not
acquainted, no ruse of service in a rough-and-tumble in which he was
unversed. He was proudly conscious, too, of his supple strength, his
endurance, and his great length of reach, and upon all these he counted
to help him make a decent fight.

Valerie, watching him, guessed his purpose to be the gaining of the
inner chamber, the crossing of the threshold on which she was standing.
She drew back a pace or two, almost mechanically, to give him room. The
movement went near to costing him his life. The light no longer falling
so pitilessly upon Fortunio's eyes, the captain saw more clearly than
hitherto, and shot a swift, deadly stroke straight at the region of
Garnache's heart. The Parisian leapt back when it was within an inch of
his breast; one of the bravoes followed up, springing a pace in advance
of his companions and lengthening his arm in a powerful lunge. Garnache
caught the blade almost on his hilt, and by the slightest turn of
the wrist made a simultaneous presentment of his point at the other's
outstretched throat. It took the fellow just above the Adam's apple, and
with a horrid, gurgling