"Great source of strength, assist me! Beware! old man," he added, "lest you drive me to despair. Remember that it is neither the sixth nor the seventh commandment in the Decalogue that may prevent me from punishing you as you deserve, and rescuing a poor victim from your tyranny."
M. d'Escombas, who was insanely jealous, grew white and livid with rage at these words; and, as he did not want for courage, laid his hand on his walking sword, for people still wore such weapons at night in the streets of Paris.
"Dare you say this to me?" he exclaimed.
"Oui, monsieur le scélérat, and more if I choose. A selfish father sells his timid daughter to a sordid wretch who buys her for rank. Was it not so, old man?"
"Granted—though she preferred a beggarly student who should have stuck to his Vauban and his Coehorn," said the other, grinding his teeth; "and what then?"
"Coldness and placid endurance of life—perhaps contentment, might have followed; but never happiness."
"But for what, you would say?"
"Your querulous tyranny—your unmanly cruelty, with the story of which all Paris rings. You have even dared to strike her—to strike her with your clenched hand, and even with your cane. Oh, malediction, my gentle Isabelle! and here, old man, I tell you you are a coward!"
"A coward—and your Isabelle! ha—we shall see what we shall see," exclaimed d'Escombas, boiling with ungovernable fury, as he swiftly drew his sword, and rushing upon Monjoy before the latter was aware, wounded him severely in the side.
This was too much for human endurance. The engineer drew his sword, and locking in, tossed up, or wrenched away the weapon of M. d'Escombas, which glittered in the starlight as the blade went twenty feet into the air. At the same moment the sword of Monjoy pierced the lungs of his adversary, who, as he whirled round in his agony before falling, received it a second time in his back. He fell on his face and expired without a groan, and Monjoy fled, full of horror, leaving his weapon in the street, behind him.