He thought it must be a
horrible illusion; he thought he was dreaming; he thought he was going
mad! After a while he collected his senses. What did they quarrel about?
That sugar! How absurd! He would give it to him--didn't want it himself.
And he began scrambling to his feet with a sudden feeling of security.
But before he had fairly stood upright, a commonsense reflection
occurred to him and drove him back into despair. He thought: "If I give
way now to that brute of a soldier, he will begin this horror again
to-morrow--and the day after--every day--raise other pretensions,
trample on me, torture me, make me his slave--and I will be lost! Lost!
The steamer may not come for days--may never come." He shook so that he
had to sit down on the floor again. He shivered forlornly. He felt he
could not, would not move any more. He was completely distracted by the
sudden perception that the position was without issue--that death and
life had in a moment become equally difficult and terrible.

All at once he heard the other push his chair back; and he leaped to
his feet with extreme facility. He listened and got confused. Must
run again! Right or left? He heard footsteps. He darted to the left,
grasping his revolver, and at the very same instant, as it seemed to
him, they came into violent collision. Both shouted with surprise. A
loud explosion took place between them; a roar of red fire, thick smoke;
and Kayerts, deafened and blinded, rushed back thinking: "I am hit--it's
all over." He expected the other to come round--to gloat over his agony.
He caught hold of an upright of the roof--"All over!" Then he heard a
crashing fall on the other side of the house, as if somebody had tumbled
headlong over a chair--then silence. Nothing more happened. He did not
die. Only his shoulder felt as if it had been badly wrenched, and he had
lost his revolver. He was disarmed and helpless! He waited for his fate.
The other man made no sound. It was a stratagem. He was stalking him
now! Along what side? Perhaps he was taking aim this very minute!

After a few moments of an agony frightful and absurd, he decided to go
and meet his doom. He was prepared for every surrender. He turned the
corner, steadying himself with one hand on the wall; made a few paces,
and nearly swooned. He had seen on the floor, protruding past the other
corner, a pair of turned-up feet. A pair of white naked feet in
red slippers. He felt deadly sick, and stood for a time i