What complications would come of his
presence Heaven alone could foretell.
"Put an end to this play-acting!" roared the savage Marsac. "It
will avail you nothing. My sister's tears may have weighed lightly
with you, but you shall pay the price of them, and of the slight
you have put upon her."
"My God, Marsac!" cried the other, roused to an equal fierceness.
"Will you explain?"
"Aye," snarled Marsac, and his sword flashed from his scabbard,
"I'll explain. As God lives, I'll explain - with this!" And he
whirled his blade under the eyes of the invalid. "Come, my master,
the comedy's played out. Cast aside that crutch and draw; draw,
man, or, sangdieu, I'll run you through as you stand!"
There was a commotion below. The landlord and a posse of his
satellites - waiters, ostlers, and stableboys - rushed between
them, and sought to restrain the bloodthirsty Marsac. But he
shook them off as a bull shakes off a pack of dogs, and like an
angry bull, too, did he stand his ground and bellow. In a moment
his sweeping sword had cleared a circle about him. In its
lightning dartings hither and thither at random, it had stung a
waiter in the calf, and when the fellow saw the blood staining his
hose, he added to the general din his shrieks that he was murdered.
Marsac swore and threatened in a breath, and a kitchen wench, from
a point of vantage on the steps, called shame upon him and abused
him roundly for a cowardly assassin to assail a poor sufferer who
could hardly stand upright.
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