t; he
knocked it aside with the butt of his gun, and it went off harmlessly.
Giletti then clutched the gun; the two men wrestled for it, and it
exploded close to Giletti's ear. Staggered for an instant, he quickly
recovered himself; drawing from its sheath a "property" sword, he fell
once more upon Fabrice.

"Look out! he will kill you," came an agitated whisper from Marietta;
"take this!"

A sort of hunting knife was flung out of the carriage door. Fabrice
picked it up, and was nearly stunned forthwith by a blow from the handle
of the "property" sword. Happily Giletti was too near to use his
sword-point. Pulling himself together, Fabrice gave his enemy a gash on
the thigh. Giletti, swearing furiously, injured Fabrice on the cheek.
Blood poured down our hero's face. The thought, "I am disfigured for
life!" flashed through his mind. Enraged at the idea, he thrust the
hunting knife at Giletti's breast with all his force. Giletti fell and
lay motionless.

"He is dead!" said Fabrice to himself. Then, turning to the coach, he
asked, "Have you a looking-glass?"

His eyes and teeth were undamaged; he was not permanently disfigured.
Hastily, then, he turned to thoughts of escape. Marietta gave him
Giletti's passport; obviously his first business was to get across the
frontier. And yet the Austrian frontier was no safe one for him to
cross. Were he recognised, he might expect ten years in an Imperial
fortress. But this was the less immediate danger, and he determined to
risk it.

With considerable trepidation he walked across the bridge, and presented
Giletti's passport to the Austrian gendarme.

The gendarme looked at it, and rose, "You must wait, monsieur; there is
a difficulty," he said, and left the room. Fabrice was profoundly
uncomfortable; he was nearly for bolting, when he heard the gendarme say
to another, "I am done up with the heat; just go and put your visa on a
passport in there when you have finished your pipe; I'm going for some
coffee."

This gendarme, in fact, knew Giletti, and was quite well aware that the
man before him was not the actor. But, for all he could tell, Giletti
had lent the passport for reasons of his own. The easiest way out of the
difficulty was to get another gendarme to see to the visa. This man
affixed it as a matter of course, and Fabrice escaped danger number one.

The rest was very easy, thanks to Ludovico, an old servant of the
Duchess, whom Fabrice met at an eating-house where