Sturm was too good a fencer to throw himself unprotected upon his enemy. He advanced sharply one pace, making un double engagement, of which Benedict turned aside the second by a dégagement fait comme on les passe au mur.
Anger had disturbed Sturm's guard, he was lunging with his head down—an attitude which, for this once at least, saved him. The dégagement merely grazed his shoulder by the neck. Blood appeared.
"A sleeve for a sleeve," retorted Benedict, falling back quickly to his guard, and leaving a great distance between the general and himself. "Now for it!"
The general found himself too far off, took a step forward, gathered all his powers, made a frenzied beating with his sword and struck straight, lunging at the full stretch of his body. All his soul, that is to say, all his hope, was in that blow.
This time Benedict, planted firmly on his feet, did not yield an inch; he caught the sword par un demi cercle, executed in due form, with his nails held upwards as though he were in a fencing school, and standing over the point of his sword inclined towards his feet:
"Now then," he said, delivering his thrust.
The sword entered the upper part of the chest and disappeared completely in the general's body where Benedict left it, as he sprang back—as a bull fighter leaves his dagger in the breast of the bull. Then, folding his arms, he waited.
The general remained standing for a second, staggered, tried to speak; his mouth became full of blood, he made a movement with his sword and the sword fell from his hand; then he, himself, like an uprooted tree, fell full length upon the turf.
The surgeon rushed to the body of Sturm; but he was already dead.
The point of the sword had gone in below the right shoulder blade, and come out on the left hip, after passing through the heart.