im
hard.

'Couldn't be more so.'

'Ah! Somehow I thought as much,' and the sculptor returned to convey the
message to the General, commander of a cavalry division, looking all leg
from his heels to his pointed ears, which in brilliancy of colour vied
with Freydet's. At Vedrine's intimation these ears flushed suddenly
scarlet, as if the blood boiled in them. 'Right, Sir! 'Course, Sir!'
His words cut the air like the lash of a whip. Sammy was being helped by
Doctor Aubouis to turn up his shirt sleeves. Did he hear? or was it the
aspect of the lithe, cat-like, vigorous young fellow as he came forward
with neck and arms bare and round as a woman's, and with that pitiless
look. Be the reason what it may, D'Athis, who had come to the ground as
a social duty without a shade of anxiety, as befitted a gentleman who
was not inexperienced and knew the value of two good seconds, suddenly
changed countenance, turned earthy pale, while his beard scarcely
concealed the twitch of his jaw in the horrible contortion of fear.
But he kept his self-control, and put himself on the defensive bravely
enough.

'Now, gentlemen.'

Yes, there is always a reckoning to pay. He realised that keenly as
he faced that pitiless sword-point, which sought him, felt him at a
distance, seemed to spare him now only to make more sure of hitting
presently. They meant to kill him; that was certain. And as he parried
the blows with his long, thin arm stretched out, amid the clashing of
the hilts he felt, for the first time, a pang of remorse for his mean
desertion of the noble lady who had lifted him out of the gutter and
given him once more a decent place in the world; he felt too that her
merited wrath was in some way connected with this present encompassing
peril, which seemed to shake the air all about him, to send round and
round in a glancing, vanishing vision the expanse of sky overhead, the
alarmed faces of the seconds and doctors, and the remoter figures of
two stable boys wildly beating off with their caps the gambolling horses
that wanted to come and look on. Suddenly came exclamations, sharp and
peremptory: 'Enough! Stop, stop!' What has happened? The peril is gone,
the sky stands still, everything has resumed its natural colour and
place. But at his feet over the torn and trampled ground spreads a
widening pool of blood, which darkens the yellow soil, and in it lies
Paul Astier helpless, with a wound right through his bare neck, stuck
like a pi