fire. De Guiche immediately understood the position of affairs. It
would be necessary to exceed De Wardes in rapidity of execution. He
advanced, therefore, so as to reach him before he should have had time to
reload his pistol. De Wardes saw him approaching like a tempest. The
ball was rather tight, and offered some resistance to the ramrod. To
load carelessly would be simply to lose his last chance; to take the
proper care in loading meant fatal loss of time, or rather, throwing away
his life. He made his horse bound on one side. De Guiche turned round
also, and, at the moment the horse was quiet again, fired, and the ball
carried off De Wardes's hat from his head. De Wardes now knew that he
had a moment's time at his own disposal; he availed himself of it in
order to finish loading his pistol. De Guiche, noticing that his
adversary did not fall, threw the pistol he had just discharged aside,
and walked straight towards De Wardes, elevating the second pistol as he
did so. He had hardly proceeded more than two or three paces, when De
Wardes took aim at him as he was walking, and fired. An exclamation of
anger was De Guiche's answer; the comte's arm contracted and dropped
motionless by his side, and the pistol fell from his grasp. His anxiety
was excessive. "I am lost," murmured De Wardes, "he is not mortally
wounded." At the very moment, however, De Guiche was about to raise his
pistol against De Wardes, the head, shoulders, and limbs of the comte
seemed to collapse. He heaved a deep-drawn sigh, tottered, and fell at
the feet of De Wardes's horse.

"That is all right," said De Wardes, and gathering up the reins, he
struck his spurs into the horse's sides. The horse cleared the comte's
motionless body, and bore De Wardes rapidly back to the chateau. When he
arrived there, he remained a quarter of an hour deliberating within
himself as to the proper course to be adopted. In his impatience to
leave the field of battle, he had omitted to ascertain whether De Guiche