place. 'A dun. I am sorry that the poor devil caught me so
inopportunely. Now however, I am at your service.'

He saluted and we crossed swords and began. But from the first I
had no doubt what the result would be. The slippery stones and
fading light gave him, it is true, some chance, some advantage,
more than he deserved; but I had no sooner felt his blade than I
knew that he was no swordsman. Possibly he had taken half-a-
dozen lessons in rapier art, and practised what he learned with
an Englishman as heavy and awkward as himself. But that was all.
He made a few wild clumsy rushes, parrying widely. When I had
foiled these, the danger was over, and I held him at my mercy.

I played with him a little while, watching the sweat gather on
his brow and the shadow of the church tower fall deeper and
darker, like the shadow of doom, on his face. Not out of cruelty
--God knows I have never erred in that direction!--but because,
for the first time in my life, I felt a strange reluctance to
strike the blow. The curls clung to his forehead; his breath
came and went in gasps; I heard the men behind me and one or two
of them drop an oath; and then I slipped--slipped, and was down
in a moment on my right side, my elbow striking the pavement so
sharply that the arm grew numb to the wrist.

He held off. I heard a dozen voices cry, 'Now! now you have
him!' But he held off. He stood back and waited with his breast
heaving and his point lowered, until I had risen and stood again.
on my guard.

'Enough! enough!' a rough voice behind me cried. 'Don't hurt