Fortini, always the cold one, always the tireless-wristed, always
sure and long, as report had it, in going about such business, on

this night elected, too, the quick and brilliant.
It was nervous, tingling work, for as surely as I sensed his

intention of briefness, just as surely had he sensed mine. I doubt
that I could have done the trick had it been broad day instead of

moonlight. The dim light aided me. Also was I aided by divining,
the moment in advance, what he had in mind. It was the time attack,

a common but perilous trick that every novice knows, that has laid
on his back many a good man who attempted it, and that is so fraught

with danger to the perpetrator that swordsmen are not enamoured of
it.

We had been at work barely a minute, when I knew under all his
darting, flashing show of offence that Fortini meditated this very

time attack. He desired of me a thrust and lunge, not that he might
parry it but that he might time it and deflect it by the customary

slight turn of the wrist, his rapier point directed to meet me as my
body followed in the lunge. A ticklish thing--ay, a ticklish thing

in the best of light. Did he deflect a fraction of a second too
early, I should be warned and saved. Did he deflect a fraction of a

second too late, my thrust would go home to him.
"Quick and brilliant is it?" was my thought. "Very well, my Italian

friend, quick and brilliant shall it be, and especially shall it be
quick."

In a way, it was time attack against time attack, but I would fool
him on the time by being over-quick. And I was quick. As I said,

we had been at work scarcely a minute when it happened. Quick?
That thrust and lunge of mine were one. A snap of action it was, an

explosion, an instantaneousness. I swear my thrust and lunge were a
fraction of a second quicker than any man is supposed to thrust and

lunge. I won the fraction of a second. By that fraction of a
second too late Fortini attempted to deflect my blade and impale me

on his. But it was his blade that was deflected. It flashed past
my breast, and I was in--inside his weapon, which extended full

length in the empty air behind me--and my blade was inside of him,
and through him, heart-high, from right side of him to left side of

him and outside of him beyond.
It is a strange thing to do, to spit a live man on a length of

steel. I sit here in my cell, and cease from writing a space, while
I consider the matter. And I have considered it often, that

moonlight night in France of long ago, when I taught the Italian
hound quick and brilliant. It was so easy a thing, that perforation

of a torso. One would have expected more resistance. There would
have been resistance had my rapier point touched bone. As it was,

it encountered only the softness of flesh. Still it perforated so
easily. I have the sensation of it now, in my hand, my brain, as I

write. A woman's hat-pin could go through a plum pudding not more
easily than did my blade go through the Italian. Oh, there was

nothing amazing about it at the time to Guillaume de Sainte-Maure,
but amazing it is to me, Darrell Standing, as I recollect and ponder

it across the centuries. It is easy, most easy, to kill a strong,
live, breathing man with so crude a weapon as a piece of steel.

Why, men are like soft-shell crabs, so tender, frail, and vulnerable
are they.

But to return to the moonlight on the grass. My thrust made home,
there was a perceptible pause. Not at once did Fortini fall. Not

at once did I withdraw the blade. For a full second we stood in
pause--I, with legs spread, and arched and tense, body thrown

forward, right arm horizontal and straight out; Fortini, his blade
beyond me so far that hilt and hand just rested lightly against my

left breast, his body rigid, his eyes open and shining.
So statuesque were we for that second that I swear those about us

were not immediately aware of what had happened. Then Fortini
gasped and coughed slightly. The rigidity of his pose slackened.

The hilt and hand against my breast wavered, then the arm drooped to
his side till the rapier point rested on the lawn. By this time

Pasquini and de Goncourt had sprung to him and he was sinking into
their arms. In faith, it was harder for me to withdraw the steel

than to drive it in. His flesh clung about it as if jealous to let
it depart. Oh, believe me, it required a distinctphysical effort

to get clear of what I had done.
But the pang of the withdrawal must have stung him back to life and

purpose, for he shook off his friends, straightened himself, and
lifted his rapier into position. I, too, took position, marvelling

that it was possible I had spitted him heart-high and yet missed any
vital spot. Then, and before his friends could catch him, his legs

crumpled under him and he went heavily to grass. They laid him on
his back, but he was already dead, his face ghastly still under the

moon, his right hand still a-clutch of the rapier.
Yes; it is indeed a marvellous easy thing to kill a man.

We saluted his friends and were about to depart, when Felix Pasquini
detained me.

"Pardon me," I said. "Let it be to-morrow."
"We have but to move a step aside," he urged, "where the grass is

still dry."
"Let me then wet it for you, Sainte-Maure," Lanfranc asked of me,

eager himself to do for an Italian.
I shook my head.

"Pasquini is mine," I answered. "He shall be first to-morrow."
"Are there others?" Lanfranc demanded.

"Ask de Goncourt," I grinned. "I imagine he is already laying claim
to the honour of being the third."

At this, de Goncourt showed distressed acquiescence. Lanfranc
looked inquiry at him, and de Goncourt nodded.

"And after him I doubt not comes the cockerel," I went on.
And even as I spoke the red-haired Guy de Villehardouin, alone,

strode to us across the moonlit grass.
"At least I shall have him," Lanfranc cried, his voice almost

wheedling, so great was his desire.
"Ask him," I laughed, then turned to Pasquini. "To-morrow," I said.

"Do you name time and place, and I shall be there."
"The grass is most excellent," he teased, "the place is most

excellent, and I am minded that Fortini has you for company this
night."

"'Twere better he were accompanied by a friend," I quipped. "And
now your pardon, for I must go."

But he blocked my path.
"Whoever it be," he said, "let it be now."

For the first time, with him, my anger began to rise.
"You serve your master well," I sneered.

"I serve but my pleasure," was his answer. "Master I have none."
"Pardon me if I presume to tell you the truth," I said.

"Which is?" he queried softly.
"That you are a liar, Pasquini, a liar like all Italians."

He turned immediately to Lanfranc and Bohemond.
"You heard," he said. "And after that you cannot deny me him."

They hesitated and looked to me for counsel of my wishes. But
Pasquini did not wait.

"And if you still have any scruples," he hurried on, "then allow me
to remove them . . . thus."

And he spat in the grass at my feet. Then my anger seized me and
was beyond me. The red wrath I call it--an overwhelming, all-

mastering desire to kill and destroy. I forgot that Philippa waited
for me in the great hall. All I knew was my wrongs--the