第55章

Suddenly, in the midst of his narrative, Johann put his leg stiffly between his enemy's and gave a mighty jerk with his arm, with the result that Maurice, wholly unprepared, went sprawling to the pavement.He was on his feet in an instant, but Johann was free and flying up the alley.Maurice gave chase, but uselessly.Johann had disappeared.The alley was a cul de sac, but was lined with doors; and these Maurice hammered to ease his conscience.No one answered.Deeply disgusted with his lack of caution, Maurice regained the street, where he brushed the dust from his knees.

"I'll take it out of his hide the next time we meet.He wasn't worth the trouble, anyway."A sybil might have whispered in his ear that a very large fish had escaped his net, but Maurice continued, conscious of nothing save chagrin and a bruised knee.He resumed the piecing together of events, or rather he attempted to; very few pieces could be brought together.If Beauvais had the certificates, what was his object in lying to Madame? What benefit would accrue to him?

After all, it was a labyrinth of paths which always brought him up to the beginning.He drooped his shoulders dejectedly.There was nothing left for him to do but return to the Red Chateau and inform them of the fruitlessness of his errand.He would start on the morrow.Tonight he wanted once more to hear the band, to wander about the park, to row around the rear of the archbishop's garden.

"A fine thing to be born in purple--sometimes," he mused."Inever knew till now the inconveniences of the common mold."He tramped on, building chateaux en Espagne.That they tumbled down did not matter; he could rebuild in the space of a second, and each castle an improvement on its predecessor.

His attention was suddenly drawn away from this idle but pleasant pursuit.In a side street he saw twenty or thirty students surging back and forth, laughing and shouting and jostling.In the center of this swaying mass canes rose and fell.

It was a fight, and as he loved a fight, Maurice pressed his hat firmly on his head and veered into the side street.He looked around guiltily, and was thankful that no feminine eyes were near to offer him their reproaches.He jostled among the outer circle, but could see nothing.He stooped.Something white flashed this way and that, accompanied by the sound of low growls.A dog fight was his first impression, and he was on the point of leaving, for, while he secretly enjoyed the sight of two physically perfect men waging battle, he had not the heart to see two brutes pitted against each other, goaded on by brutes of a lower caste.But even as he turned the crowd opened and closed, and the brief picture was enough for him.

Her dog! And the students were beating it because they knew it to be defenseless.Her dog! toothless and old, who could not hold when his jaws closed on an arm or leg, but who, with that indomitable courage of his race, fought on and on, hopelessly and stubbornly.

He was covered with blood, one of his legs was hurt, but still the spirit burned.It was cowardly.Maurice's jaws assumed a particularly ferocious angle.Her dog! Rage choked him.With an oath he flung this student aside and that, fought his way to the center.A burly student, armed with a stout cane, was the principal aggressor.

Maurice doubled his fist and swung a blow which had one hundred and sixty pounds behind it, and it landed squarely on the cheek of the student, who dropped face downward and lay still.This onslaught was so sudden and unexpected that the students were confounded.But Maurice, whose plans crystallized in moments like these, picked up the cane and laid it about him.

The students swore and yelled and stumbled over one another in their wild efforts to dodge the vindictive cane.Maurice cleared a wide circle.The dog, half blinded by his blood and not fully comprehending this new phase in the tide of events, lunged at Maurice, who nimbly eluded him.Finally the opportunity came.He flung the cane into the yelling pack, with his left arm caught the dog about the middle, and leaped back into the nearest doorway.The muscles of his left arm were sorely tried; the dog considered his part in the fray by no means ended, and he tugged and yelped huskily.With his right hand Maurice sought his revolver, cocked and leveled it.There came a respite.The students had not fully recovered from their surprise, and the yells sank into murmurs.

"You curs!" said Maurice, panting."Shame on you! and an old dog that can't defend himself! You knew he had no teeth.""God save your Excellency!" laughed a student in the rear, who had not tasted the cane; "you may be sure we knew he had no teeth or we wouldn't have risked our precious calves.Don't let him scare you with the popgun, comrades.At him, my brave ones;he will be more sport than the dog! Down with the Osians, dogs, followers and all!""Come on, then," said Maurice, whose fighting blood was at heat.

"Come on, if you think it isn't over.There are six bullets in this popgun, and I don't give a particular damn where they go.

Come on!"

Whether or not this challenge would have been accepted remains unwritten.There now came on the air the welcome sound of galloping hoofs, and presently two cuirassiers wheeled into the street.What Maurice had left undone with the cane the cuirassiers completed with the flat of their sabers.They had had a brush with the students the night before, and they went at them as if determined to take both interest and principal.The students dispersed like leaves in the wind--all save one.He rose to his feet, his hands covering his jaw and a dazed expression in his eyes.He saw Maurice with the revolver, the cuirassiers with their sabers, and the remnant of his army flying to cover, and he decided to follow their example.The scene had changed somewhat since he last saw it.He slunk off at a zigzag trot.

One of the cuirassiers dismounted, his face red from his exertions.