“Let me go!” she jerked to be free. “I’ll—help you!”
He did not mean to let her go when she struggled free; he was still trying to hold to her and also fight the man who was beating at him. But her getting free, let him close with his assailant and grapple with him. They spun about and went down, rolling over and over in the débris. Ruth grabbed up a bit of iron pipe from among the wreckage on the floor; and she bent over trying to strike at the man with the bludgeon.
“Help!” she called out. “Secours!”
She knew now that the man who had waited outside was no mere defender of the house; the treachery and the violence of his attack could not be explained by concern for safety of that ruin. Ruth could not think who the man might be or what was his object except that he was fighting to kill, as he struck and fought with Byrne on the floor. And Byrne, knowing it, was fighting to kill him, too.
“Secours!” Ruth screamed for help again and with her bit of iron, she struck—whom, she did not know. But they rolled away and pounded each other only a few moments more before one overcame the other. One leaped up while the other lay on the floor; the one who had leaped up, crouched down and bludgeoned the other again; so that Ruth knew that Byrne was the one who lay still. She screamed out again for help while she flung herself at the man who was bending over. But he turned about and caught her arms and held her firmly. He bent his head to hers and whispered to her while he held her.
“Weg!” The whisper warned her. It was German, “Away!” And the rest that he said was in German. “I have him for you struck dead! Careful, now! Away to Switzerland!”
He dropped Ruth and fled; she went after him, breathless, trying to cry out; but her cries were weak and unheard. He ran through the rear of the house into a narrow alley down which he disappeared; she went to the end of the alley, crying out. But the man was gone. She stopped running at last and ceased to call out. She stood, swaying so that she caught to a railing before a house to steady herself. The words of the whisper ran on her lips. “I have him for you struck dead!”
They gave her explanation of the attack which, like the words of De Trevenac to her, permitted only one possible meaning. The man who had waited in the ruined house must have been one of the German agents in Paris whom Ruth had returned to meet. Evidently, while Byrne had been inquiring for her, the Germans too had been vigilant; they had awaited her return either to get her report of what she had seen in Picardy or to assign her to another task or—she could not know why they awaited her; but certainly they had. One of them had learned that afternoon that she had returned; he was seeking her, perhaps, when Byrne found her. Perhaps he had known the peril to her from Byrne; perhaps he merely had learned, from whatever he had overheard of their talk in that ruined room, that Byrne accused her of being a German spy; and so he had taken his chance to strike, for her, Byrne dead.
The horror of this realization sickened her; the German murderer “for her” had made good his escape; and it would be useless to report him now. She would be able to offer no description of him; and to report that a large man, who was a German spy, had been about that part of Paris this evening would be idle. But she must return at once to Byrne who might not be dead. So she steadied herself and hastened down the street seeking the ruined house.
It was a part of Paris quite unfamiliar to her; and, as she had not observed where she and Byrne had wandered, she passed a square or two without better placing herself; and then, inquiring of a passer-by, where was a ruined house, she obtained directions which seemed to be correct; but arriving at the ruin, she found it was not the one which Byrne and she had entered. Consequently it was many minutes before she found the ruined house which gave her no doubt of its identity. For people were gathered about it; and Ruth, approaching these, learned that a monstrous attack had been made upon an American infantry officer who, when first found, was believed to have been killed; but the surgeon who had arrived and had removed him, said this was not so. Robbery, some said, had been the motive of the crime; for the officer had much money in his pocket; but the murderer had not time to remove it. Others, who claimed to have heard a girl’s voice, believed there might have been more personal reasons; why had a man and a girl been in those rooms that night?