He turned to the executioner, and giving him the sign, the wretch threw Léon upon the plank.
It was then that Bardot, at the window, fired his pistol and struck the great bell high in the tower above. How much would I have given could I have been at his side at that moment. All that I heard were the loud shouts of surprise, the cries of one man to the other that this was an ambush, and, above all, the prince's screams when the great knife fell and severed his arm at the elbow as neatly as any surgeon could have done.
Such was the truth. At the moment of the alarm Prince Nicholas had loosed the rope, and, trying to catch it again, he stumbled forward and the great blade caught him by the elbow, and his hand and arm went rolling to the floor.
With a loud cry Léon now wrenched himself from his executioners. All were making for the gate of the tower, for they believed that the French were upon them, and no man thought of anything but his own safety.
VIII
Bardot and myself believed that the Cossacks were galloping to the place, and we lay in the shadow of the bridge, hardly daring to breathe lest the Russians in the house should discover us. When the latter came headlong out of the tower this alarm seemed unnecessary, for it was plain they were making for the forest.
"In five minutes," I said, "they will meet their fellows and all return again to the butchery."
I little knew that Valerie St. Antoine had found the droshky in the wood, and commanding the driver in the name of Prince Nicholas, had driven at full gallop to the barracks to bring help to her countrymen.
Such was the case, however, and the men who now rode to Ivan's Tower were of Léon's own troop; honest fellows who swore a bitter vengeance while they rode. They fell upon the Russians at the heart of the wood, and what they did there is best told at a bivouac. I went immediately to the tower and looked there for my nephew.
When I found him he lay senseless upon the scaffold, and at first I thought he was dead. The Guard, however, is obstinate in refusing to die, and when we had forced brandy between his lips and had bathed his forehead, he opened his eyes and asked where he was.