Again from the now absolutely livid lips there came the same words, or almost the same, he had previously uttered.
"I deny nothing—I assert nothing," and he advanced past the table to where St. Georges stood, weapon in hand.
"So be it! Yet, for the last time, ere it is too late, answer me one question and I will not force you to this encounter to-night. Tell me where my child is, let me regain possession of her, and a month hence, on my honour as a soldier, I meet you again, and, if you desire it, give you satisfaction."
"I do not know where your child is," De Roquemaure muttered hoarsely. "And for your honour as a soldier—you are a broken one. A man dismissed the army has no honour left."
"Enough!" said St. Georges; "you knew that—knew, not that I am broken, but that I was to be broken! Now I understand who two of my enemies are for sure. Thus I dispose of one. En garde!"
"Kill him!" he heard the woman hiss again as they commenced. "Kill him dead, Raoul!"
A moment later they were engaged, each seeking the other's life. And each knew that nothing but his death would satisfy his adversary.
Their weapons scarcely made any noise, so quietly the one stole upon the other, as point pressed point, and through the swords the power of their wrists made itself felt. Once De Roquemaure lunged savagely, but the thrust was parried and returned—dangerously so. The point of St. Georges's weapon slit his sleeve as, like an adder's tongue, it darted forth. Then the other drew back and fought more carefully, though the beads of sweat stood on his white forehead now. And St. Georges, observing them, knew that he held him safe. His nerve was gone already—the nearness of that thrust had shattered it!
The woman, looking on—her face also as white as a corpse's—was, perhaps, the strangest figure of the three. Her eyes shone like coals through the mask-holes now—her figure shook all over; one hand clutched the coarse cover on the table in a mass of folds; the other tremblingly played with the hilt of her little dagger. And the Brecquiny being near her, she more than once released the table cover to pour out a glass full, drain it a draught, throw down the glass, and glare at the combatants again.
Once, too, she shrieked aloud as a second time St. Georges's weapon, lunging full at the other's breast, was just caught by the hilt of De Roquemaure's sword and parried, though not without tearing from his breast a piece of the lace from his cravat. And she struck herself on the mouth with her clinched hand—so that her lips were bloody a moment after—as though in rage with herself for having done aught to alarm the house.