Out of the darkness of the upper landing had sprung a terrible figure. For an instant, as it gathered itself to bound down the broad and shallow flight of stairs, it was vaguely and weirdly outlined by the uncertain candlelight below.
A man, towering, fierce; coatless and without waist-coat. His face was white and distorted with wrath. His eyes blazed in the half-light like living coals. His gray hair was a-bristle.
Above his head flashed a sword-blade.
“Yankee Sessions!” croaked the drunken guerrilla, in babbling fear. “Yankee Sessions’s ghost! Just as he came at me that day when—”
The man at the stair-head cleared the intervening steps in three bounds. With a berserk yell he was among the guerrillas, his swirling sword giving forth a million sparks of reflection from the candle-glow.
There was a moment of wild turmoil; of clashing, of yells, of madly stamping feet.
Mrs. Sessions, leaning weakly against the newel-post of the banisters, saw an indistinguishable mass of figures, whirling, jostling, screaming; while once and again above the ruck flashed the sword-blade like a tongue of silver flame.
A cleverly aimed sweep of the blade as the knot of men swayed bodily toward the table, and both candle sconces were knocked violently to the floor.
The sudden darkness was too much for the guerrillas’ drink-shaken nerves. Still in strong doubt as to whether the hero who had attacked them were ghost or human, they had made shift momentarily to hold their ground.
But to cope in the dark with a possible wraith—a homicidal wraith at that—was more than they had bargained for.