Antoine turned, with Nick’s rapier in his grasp, and approached the table behind which the count still lingered.
“You are a dog,” he said quite calmly. “See! I treat you so!”
He withdrew a glove from his pocket, and after wadding it in his hand, threw it deliberately into the count’s face.
“It shall be fair play, count,” said Nick, “if you have the courage and the skill to fight with Antoine.”
But he need not have said it. At the blow of the glove, and because of a little, nervous laugh uttered by Bessie Harlan, the count seized the rapier from the table in front of him and leaped from his barricade into the center of the room.
In an instant the two were at it, and the fighting was rapid, furious, deadly.
Nick knew that such a pace could not last, and for a moment he felt a qualm lest Antoine should fall before the fury of the count’s attack. But he speedily discovered that there was no need for his misgivings, for the combat was as fatal as it was swift.
One lunge the count gave which seemed impossible for Antoine to parry; nor did he do so. But he stepped quickly backward beyond the reach of the point, and then lunged forward his own weapon, so that he put the point of it, to the guard, straight through his adversary’s breast, piercing his heart.
It was all done so quickly, and it was over so suddenly, that neither of the spectators had time to realize it; and the stroke was so deadly that the count sank back upon the floor with only a sigh. He never uttered another sound after that.