Toutou and Hilmi Bey went for Nikka. He was bleeding from a cut in the arm, and all his men were engaged. Hugh, with King and Watty, was developing an encircling movement on the opposite end of the line. I started to go to Nikka's aid, but a man sprang at me from nowhere, and I was obliged to dodge him until I had a chance to shoot, I did not miss that time. When I looked again, Nikka and Toutou were circling each other, and Hilmi was at grips with Kara.
At first I thought the Levantine was scheming to throw the girl, but as I drew near I perceived that he had clinched with her in mortal terror of her knife. She held his own powerless by her grasp of his wrist. A mocking light gleamed in her eyes, and she shook back her loose hair and jeered at him in the Tzigane dialect. With one pudgy hand he strove to ward off her blade, but he could not control her lithe muscles. She tore her wrist free, the steel drove home through his sodden frock-coat and he collapsed with a squeal.
Kara pulled out her knife as casually as though it had been a familiar occurrence, and turned to watch Nikka's fight with Toutou. Nikka from the corner of his eye saw the two of us, plainly waiting a chance to help him, and he leaped clear of the circle of his enemy's knife long enough to snap:
"Let be! I finish this alone!"
I couldn't have helped him, in any case, for as redoubtable a person as Tokalji, himself, attacked me that moment. Kara did not even notice my danger. She also ignored the man she called father. Her whole attention was concentrated upon Nikka. I fired once at the Gypsy chief, and missed. That was the last cartridge in the magazine, and I attempted to lose him in the rain. But he refused to be lost, and I was making up my mind to taking his knife in my wounded arm and battering his head with my pistol-butt, when Watkins loomed in the mist and brought down his trusty crowbar on Tokalji's knife-wrist. The Gypsy yelped like a dog, and the knife clattered on the ground. Watty produced some rope from a pocket and deftly twisted the man's arms behind him. Tokalji yelped again.
"Easy," I said. "The fellow's wrist is broken."
"I'm tying 'im above the helbows, Mister Jack, sir," answered Watty. "But if it did 'urt 'im a bit I wouldn't worry, sir. I 'ave an hidea, sir, 'e was one of the scoundrels that bashed me 'ead."
My one thought was of Nikka, and I sought him over the rain-battered area of the court. The fighting had drifted away toward the sea-wall. There seemed to be nobody near me. I listened hard, and in a lull of the storm my ears detected the click of blades. I stumbled toward it, and nearly fell on top of Kara, crouching as I had left her, eyes glued on the two men who circled tirelessly, steel-tipped arms crooked before them.
Toutou had a huge advantage in reach, but Nikka had the benefit of lithe agility, a wrist of iron—the result of years of bowing; a hawk's eyes; and all the tricks with the blade that the people of his race have amassed in centuries of bloody strife. Four times, while I watched, Toutou endeavored to force down Nikka's knife by the sheer strength of his gorilla-arm, and each time Nikka disengaged and refused to give the opportunity his adversary needed. Twice Nikka tried a certain trick, a combination of lightning thrusts and clever footwork. But the Frenchman parried it each time, and retaliated so quickly as to drive Nikka out of reach.
Neither of them said anything. Toutou spat and whined in his throat, cat-fashion. Nikka panted from the exertion. Both of them dripped with sweat, notwithstanding the rain. There was something of an epic quality about their struggle, and I discovered myself taking the same almost impersonal interest in it that Kara demonstrated. By all the principles of normal right-behavior, I should have ignored Nikka's command to let him fight it out alone, and rushed in at the first opening to kill a monster, who did not deserve and had no appreciation of knightly treatment. But I could not. I was chained by an emotion I could not fathom.