Ruperta turned from him, disdainfully impatient. “I cannot discuss the matter with you, Count, especially as I have good reasons for believing no word you say.”
He gave a shrug. “It is most unfortunate, I must repeat, this persistence in imagining my ill-will. As for your interest in the Lieutenant’s welfare, I can only refer you to Baron Rollmar, to whom it is now my duty to conduct you.”
He advanced to her with outstretched hand. She shrank from him. Ompertz whispered a word to her as he fell back a pace. These movements altered the relative positions of the three. Ruperta had scarcely caught the soldier’s whisper, but she was quick-witted enough to divine his intention. She suffered Irromar to lay his hand on her arm. It gave her an excuse for struggling—to make a sudden clutch at the hand which held the pistol. Simultaneously Ompertz gave a swift spring, and, as Ruperta’s hold hampered the Count from turning to meet his attack, seized him from behind and got his arm tightly round his neck.
Irromar was a very Hercules, but now he was taken at a disadvantage, and Ompertz was of strength far above the average. It was a fierce joy to him to find his muscles round that lying throat, and in a very few seconds he had the Count half-throttled on the ground. Then the pistol was wrested away, and their enemy lay at their mercy.
“Now let me put an end to the villain,” Ompertz gasped, as with fingers gripping the Count’s throat and knee pressing on his chest he held out his hand for the pistol.
“Ruperta’s hold hampered the Count from turning to meet his attack.”
Page [276].
But Ruperta refused. Perhaps the livid, distorted face showed her too vividly the horror of such a midnight deed, and obscured the sense of expediency.
“No,” she objected. “We cannot. He must not die here—like this.”