if we had been a company, and in the clatter of their heels on
the stones they could not count our feet. They knew not how many
followers the darkness held. The group parted. Two men remained in hot
combat close under the left wall. Across the way one sturdy fighter held
off two, while a sixth man, crying on his mates to follow, fled down the
lane.

M. Etienne knew now what he was about, and at once took sides with the
solitary fencer. The combat being made equal, I started in pursuit of
the flying figure. I had run but a few yards, however, when I tripped
and fell prostrate over the body of a man. I was up in a moment, feeling
him to find out if he were dead; my hands over his heart dipped into a
pool of something wet and warm like new milk. I wiped them on his sleeve
as best I could, and hastily groped about for his sword. He did not need
it now, and I did.

When I rose with it my quarry was swallowed up in the shadows. M.
Etienne, whose light clothing made a distinguishable spot in the gloom,
had driven his opponent, or his opponent had driven him, some rods up
the lane the way we had come. I stood perplexed, not knowing where to
busy myself. M. Etienne's side I could not reach past the two duels; and
of the four men near me, I could by no means tell, as they circled
about and about, which were my chosen allies. They were all sombrely
clad, their faces blurred in the darkness. When one made a clever pass,
I knew not whether to rejoice or despair. But at length I picked out one
who fenced, though valiantly enough, yet with greater effort than the
rest; and I deemed that this had been the hardest pressed of all and
must certainly be one of the attacked and the one most deserving of
succour. He was plainly losing ground. I darted to his side just as his
foe ran him through the arm.

The assailant pulled his blade free and darted back against the wall to
face the two of us. But the sword of the wounded man fell from his loose
fingers.

"I'm out of it," he cried to me; "I go for aid." And as his late
combatant sprang forward to engage me, I heard him running off,
stumbling where I had.

There had been little light toward the last in the court of the house in
the Rue Coupejarrets, and less under the windows of the Hotel de
Lorraine; but here was none at all, I had to use my sword solely by the
feel of his against it, and I underwent chilling qualms lest presently,
without in the least knowing how it got there, I shou