were placed opposite each
other, with their coats buttoned up to the chin, and their pistols held
rigidly by their side.

Varhely was as motionless as if made of granite. Menko smiled.

"One! Two!" counted Valla.

He paused as if to take breath: then--

"Three!" he exclaimed, in the tone of a man pronouncing a
death-sentence; and the handkerchief fell.

There were two reports in quick succession.

Varhely stood erect in his position; Menko's ball had cut a branch above
his head, and the green leaves fell fluttering to the ground.

Michel staggered back, his hand pressed to his left side.

His seconds hastened toward him, seized him under the arms, and tried to
raise him.

"It is useless," he said. "It was well aimed!"

And, turning to Varhely, he cried, in a voice which he strove to render
firm:

"Remember your promise!"

They opened his coat. The ball had entered his breast just above the
heart.

They seated him upon the grass, with his back against a tree.

He remained there, with fixed eyes, gazing, perhaps, into the infinite,
which was now close at hand.

His lips murmured inarticulate names, confused words:
"Pardon--punishment--Marsa--"

As Yanski Varhely, with his two seconds, again passed the straw-workers,
the girls saluted them with:

"Well, where are your other friends? Have they found their sweethearts?"

And while their laughter rang out upon the air, the gay, foolish
laughter of youth and health, over yonder they were bearing away the
dead body of Michel Menko.

....................

Andras Zilah, with a supreme effort at self-control, listened to his old
friend relate this tale; and, while Varhely spoke, he was thinking:

It was not a lover, it was not Menko, whom Marsa expected. Between the
Tzigana and himself there was now nothing, nothing but a phantom. The
other had paid his debt with his life. The Prince's anger disappeared as
suddenly in proportion as his exasperation had been violent.

He contemplated Marsa, thin and pale, but beautiful still. The very
fixedness of her great eyes gave her a strange and powerful attraction;
and, in the manner in which Andras regarded her, Count Varhely, with his
rough insight, saw that there were pity, astonishment, and almost fear.

He pulled his moustache a moment in reflection, and then made a step
toward the door.

Marsa saw that he was about to leave the room; and, moving away from the
marble against which she had been