The other drew his sword rapidly, and, waiting until he did so, Maharbal charged him. Idherbal struck a mighty blow as he approached, but Maharbal, bending to his horse’s neck, and, with all the skill of the famed Numidian riders, throwing his whole body on the further side of his steed, the sword met no resistance, but only whistled through the air. Back in his saddle in an instant, Maharbal, still crouched low, lunged home with the point of his weapon at the joint in the armour beneath his antagonist’s arm. The blow told; but, even as the red blood spurted out, the young giant withdrew his sword, and, with a second blow—a terrible, sweeping cut—caught Idherbal just below the helmet at the neck. The wretched man’s head, helmet and all, flew spinning off into the middle of the street, while his body fell on the other side.
“Here, sirrah!” cried Maharbal to the young noble who had been addressed by Elissa, who, with all her companions, had been forced to turn and watch the rapid and bloody conflict, “come hither instantly.”
Tremblingly the young man approached Maharbal, and terrified he viewed his bloody sword. For he also had been a laugher, and feared his own instant death.
“Take up that head,” he commanded, in a loud voice. “It is the head of Idherbal, the son of Mago.”
The young man submissively picked up the bloody head, bleeding in its casque, of the man who had been living and laughing like himself but a minute previously.
“Present the head to the Lady Elissa,” he said, “and ask her whether or no it be the head of one of the stranger officers of the mercenaries who hath dared to insult her by laughing at her words without first having with her a proper acquaintance. Inform her that there are plenty more useless heads about—thine own, for instance. Go!” he thundered, “and that instantly,” as the young man hesitated, “or I will depute someone else to carry both Idherbal’s head and thine own to the Lady Elissa.”
This was quite enough for the young noble. So terrible was the look in Maharbal’s eye that the face of everyone present, as well as his own, was blanched with fear. He rushed to Elissa and deposited the terrible emblem of the sanguinary conflict at her feet.
Maharbal rode to where she stood. With his bloody glaive he pointed first to the head at her feet, then to the trunk from which the blood was still oozing, forming a large crimson pool on the highway.
“See what thy laugh hath cost, Elissa,” quoth he. “Thou hast caused the death of a brave man, who was full of health and vigour, full of hope and happiness, only two minutes ago. That life which hath now gone to Eternity might just as well have been mine own. Thou little fool! I loved thee before, but now I hate thee for having been the cause of my shedding innocent blood. Get thee gone home; never let me see thy fair face again, since I have killed a man simply for its contemptuous smile! Art thou satisfied with thy work? Begone, Elissa, I say, begone, Hannibal’s daughter, or I will slay thee, too, for all that thou hast been to me, even as my wife! For thou art a dangerous woman. Begone, I say!”
Again Maharbal thundered these last words in such a terrible tone that everyone in the street trembled before him. He was well known for his bravery in battle; but no one had ever seen him in the fiercest conflict aroused like this. Even his followers tried vainly each to get behind his fellow, so terrified of his fearful anger was each and every one. As for Elissa herself, she at that moment once more loved Maharbal quite as much as she feared him, and loved him all the more because she did so fear him. Trembling, she fell upon her knees in the street before him, towering there on his war-horse, and looking the very picture of vengeance. Everyone else, from the great and sudden fear of the commander, who had showed so well his power to prove his strength, and right to command by force of arms, and from respect for the great Hannibal’s daughter, had now fallen back and out of earshot, so her words were heard by him alone.