cry he sank, stretched as he still was in the
attitude of that murderous lunge that had proved fatal only to himself.

Garnache had come on guard again upon the instant. Yet in the briefest
of seconds during which his sword had been about its work of death,
Fortunio's rapier came at him a second time. He beat the blade aside
with his bare left hand and stopped with his point the rush of the
other bravo. Then he leapt back again, and his leap brought him to
the threshold of the anteroom. He retreated quickly a pace, and then
another. He was a sword's length within the chamber, and now he stood,
firm as a rock and engaged Fortunio's blade which had followed him
through the doorway. But he was more at his ease. The doorway was
narrow. Two men abreast could not beset him, since one must cumber the
movements of the other. If they came at him one at a time, he felt that
he could continue that fight till morning, should there still by then be
any left to face him.

A wild exultation took him, an insane desire to laugh. Surely
was sword-play the merriest game that was ever devised for man's
entertainment. He straightened his arm, and his steel went out like a
streak of lightning. But for the dagger on which he caught its edge,
the blade had assuredly pierced the captain's heart. And now, fighting
still, Garnache called to Valerie. He had need of her assistance to make
his preparations ere others came.

"Set down your tapers, mademoiselle," he bade her, "on the mantel shelf
at my back. Place the other candle branch there too."

Swiftly, yet with half-swimming senses, everything dim to her as to one
in a nightmare, she ran to do his bidding; and now the light placed so
at his back, gave him over his opponents the same slight advantage that
he had enjoyed before. In brisk tones he issued his fresh orders.

"Can you move the table, mademoiselle?" he asked her. "Try to drag it
here, to the wall on my left, as close to the door as you can bring it."

"I will try, monsieur," she panted through dry lips; and again she moved
to do his bidding. Quickened by the need there was, her limbs, which
awhile ago had seemed on the point of refusing their office, appeared to
gather more than ordinary strength. She was unconsciously sobbing in her
passionate anxiety to render him what help was possible. Frenziedly she
caught at the heavy oaken table, and began to drag it across the room as
Garnache had begged her. And now, Fortunio seeing what