scattering like quicksilver in the endless whirl and clash.

Teppich was gaping foolishly, Sturgeon shaking his head, the Cockney,
with narrow body drawn together, watching, shivering, squatting on toes
and finger-tips, like a runner about to spring from a mark. Rudolph,
dizzy with pain and suspense, nursed his forearm mechanically. The
hurried, silver ring of the hilts dismayed him, the dust from the garden
path choked him like an acrid smoke.

Suddenly Chantel, dropping low like a deflected arrow, swooped in with
fingers touching the ground. On "three feet," he had delivered the blow
so long withheld.

The watchers shouted. Nesbit sprang up, released. But Heywood, by some
desperate sleight, had parried the certainty, and even tried a riposte.
Still afoot and fighting, he complained testily above the sword-play:--

"Don't shout like that! Fair field, you chaps!"

Above the sword-play, too, came gradually a murmur of voices. Through
the dust, beyond the lunging figures, Rudolph was distantly aware of
crowded bodies, of yellow faces grinning or agape, in the breach of the
compound wall. Men of the neighboring hamlet had gathered, to watch the
foreign monsters play at this new, fantastic game. Shaven heads bobbed,
saffron arms pointed, voices, sharp and guttural, argued scornfully.

The hilts rang, the blades grated faster. But now it was plain that
Heywood could do no more, by luck or inspiration. Fretted by his clumsy
yet strong and close defense, Chantel was forcing on the end. He gave a
panting laugh. Instantly, all saw the weaker blade fly wide, the