Black Ferguson chuckled like a fiend. "Faint-hearted, Father? Take a lesson from the girl. Powder or no powder, we must have light!"
The sulphur match crackled on the wall. Ferguson shielded the sputtering blue flame with his hands, but even while he shielded it, the match was struck from his fingers, and he was locked in a pair of powerful arms.
"Let go, priest!" he commanded laughingly. "Where in the devil did you get such muscles?" He imagined Brochet had gripped him.
But his laugh and his voice died in the strain. He could only choke out a curse and bend to his sudden mad struggle for freedom.
Over by the door Father Brochet heard the sounds of conflict, the hard breathing, heavy trampling, smashing of boxes and barrels, crashing of overturned goods. He thought it was Desirée striving against the Nor'wester. He rushed to her aid, but the strong whirl of men's fighting bodies hurled him into a corner. Almost under his feet Desirée gave a frightened cry, and, stooping, the priest groped for her.
He gathered her in his arms. "Are you hurt, daughter? Are you hurt?"
"No, no," she assured him. "I landed on the fur-bales, and they were soft. But, God of Heaven, what is happening?"
"It must be Dunvegan—and Ferguson. And one will kill the other!"
In the dark they crouched back from the stamping feet. Not a thing was visible. They might have been in some medieval dungeon or charnel vault where monsters of old were writhing in death-grapples. Desirée was trembling all over. She clung to Brochet, her eyes straining for an unrewarded glimpse of the furious antagonists. If she could only see! That was what wracked her. The fear that invisible horror engenders shattered her supersensitive nerves. On the verge of hysteria she listened, praying for the end.
Then huge as giants in the spray of light she saw two men stagger into the central space of the floor. She saw one man's body bend as willow in the other's arms, heard it crack like a broken branch. Sweeter than any sound she had ever heard, Dunvegan's voice rang clearly.