He looked him straight in the eyes. The other was livid, quivering with impotent strength.
"You milksop!" Sernine sneered. "I shall never make anything of you. Shall I tell you the truth? Well, you're afraid of me. Yes, old chap, you never feel quite sure what may happen to you when you're face to face with me. You want to act, whereas it's my acts, my possible acts that govern the situation. No, it's quite clear that you're not the man yet to put out my star!"
He had not finished speaking when he felt himself seized round the throat and dragged backward. Some one hiding in the shrubbery, near the little door, had caught him by the head. He saw a hand raised, armed with a knife with a gleaming blade. The hand fell; the point of the knife caught him right in the throat.
At the same moment Altenheim sprang upon him to finish him off; and they rolled over into the flower-borders. It was a matter of twenty or thirty seconds at most. Powerful and experienced wrestler as he was, Altenheim yielded almost immediately, uttering a cry of pain. Sernine rose and ran to the little door, which had just closed upon a dark form. It was too late. He heard the key turn in the lock. He was unable to open it.
"Ah, you scoundrel!" he said. "The day on which I catch you will be the day on which I shed my first blood! That I swear to God! . . ."
He went back, stooped and picked up the pieces of the knife, which had broken as it struck him.
Altenheim was beginning to move. Sernine asked:
"Well, baron, feeling better? You didn't know that blow, eh? It's what I call the direct blow in the solar plexus; that is to say, it snuffs out your vital sun like a candle. It's clean, quick, painless . . . and infallible. Whereas a blow with a dagger . . . ? Pooh! A man has only to wear a little steel-wove gorget, as I do, and he can set the whole world at defiance, especially your little pal in black, seeing that he always strikes at the throat, the silly monster! . . . Here, look at his favorite plaything . . . smashed to atoms!"
He offered him his hand:
"Come, get up, baron. You shall dine with me. And do please remember the secret of my superiority: an undaunted soul in an unassailable body."