And then it was too late for anyone to do anything about it. For the ashtray caught the man directly between the eyes and he fell forward on his face without a whimper.
But then everybody in the room seemed to galvanize into action.
The man beside the girl lunged forward, but she tripped him with her foot as he passed, sending him sprawling to the floor. Major Lanser wheeled and leaped toward the mantle. His hand closed over a slim, deadly fencing foil and, with an oath, he whirled to face D’Artagnan.
But the musketeer had moved, too. With a lithe sidestep he evaded the Major’s savage lunge and leaped for the other foil. With it gleaming in his hand, he swung to meet Major Lanser, a grim smile on his face.
Major Lanser moved forward, catlike, the sword in his hand twitching like a snake about to strike.
“This will be interesting,” he murmured. Over his shoulder he snapped to the man who had tripped over the girl’s foot, “Watch the others. I will handle our collegiate Don Quixote.”
“No!” the girl cried. “It isn’t fair. He hasn’t a chance against you.”
“I will be gentle with him,” Major Lanser smiled. He moved forward in a lithe deadly fencer’s crouch. “I will not kill him quickly.”
“You fiend!” the girl cried. She tried vainly to jerk loose from the man who held her. “Don’t duel him!” she cried, struggling to face D’Artagnan. “Don’t you see, he’s planning to cut you to ribbons?”
D’Artagnan was leaning against the mantle, almost lazily, but his narrowed eyes watched Lanser’s every move.
“Save your sympathy for the Major,” he murmured. “He is more likely to have need of it. I am not exactly unaccustomed to the sport of fencing.”
“This is not going to be a sporting contest,” the Major said grimly. With a sudden feint he lunged to the right, then crossed back to the left and his sword flashed at D’Artagnan.
Philip cried out involuntarily, but D’Artagnan’s sword had somehow sprung magically to meet the Major’s, and steel crashed unavailingly against steel.
“A good defense,” the Major said, breathing through stiff lips.
“Let us test yours,” D’Artagnan said cooly.
His sword seemed to flash with the speed of light. His lean body shifted forward.
A hoarse shuddering gasp broke from the Major’s throat.
The point of D’Artagnan’s blade was touching his shirt and D’Artagnan was poised to lunge, a grim, merciless smile hovering about his lips.
The Major’s sword was at his side. He had been caught completely off guard by the speed and skill of D’Artagnan’s thrust.
His breathing was ragged as he waited for the cold steel to drive forward into his body. But D’Artagnan stepped back and raised his sword.
“En guarde!” he cried. “You wanted time to kill me slowly and I shall give you all the time you need.”
Major Lanser raised his sword and stepped back, watching D’Artagnan with nervously eyes. The stiff hard lines of his face were dissolving into a mask of fear. He wet his thin, lips with his tongue as D’Artagnan moved slowly toward him.
“It is not really fair for me to use my right arm,” D’Artagnan murmured, almost to himself. “Athos, himself, has trouble with my right arm.”
With a smile he shifted the foil to his left hand. “This should give you a better chance, Major Lanser.”
Major Lanser lunged forward savagely, his face twisted with an insane rage. There was a blazing light of anticipated triumph in his eyes.
“No man alive can stand against me with his left hand,” he cried.
D’Artagnan parried the thrust with a turn of his wrist, without shifting the position of his body.
“There is always the first time for such things,” he said.
Lanser lunged forward again, his breath coming raggedly, and D’Artagnan slipped to one side with the ease of a shadow moving against a wall. His blade flashed down in a spinning arc. Steel rang against steel as Lanser’s blade flew from his hand and fell to the floor a dozen feet from where he stood.
“You seem to have lost something, Major,” D’Artagnan murmured. His blade was resting lightly in his hand and the Major stared at it as if it were something bewitched.
“You — you devil!” he cried hoarsely. “Who are you?” His face was flushed and there was a flicker of foam on his lips. With a sudden movement he sprang back and shouted to the man who was holding the red haired girl.
“Cover him. Drop him if he takes a step toward me.”
Phillip cried, “Watch out.”
Major Lanser’s henchman shifted around and covered D’Artagnan with his gun.
“All right, buddy,” he snapped. “Take one move and I’ll let you have it.”
D’Artagnan looked at the man and shrugged.
“You seem to be in the saddle,” he said. He bowed ironically to Major Lanser and tossed his foil to the floor.
The Major’s breathing gradually returned to normal.
“You will pay for that little exhibition, my friend,” he said to D’Artagnan.
Philip watched the scene tensely. The man with the gun, a heavy-set, florid individual who looked like a movie gangster, was standing with his back to the open door, about twelve feet from where he stood. There was nothing within reach which he could throw at the man and he was too far away to tackle. There was nothing he or anyone else could do.
“You have a silencer on that gun,” the Major snapped to his gunman, “let our young friend have it-.”
The man raised his gun slowly and took aim.
At that very instant a huge shape appeared in the doorway behind him, and a deep voice said, “Mon Dieu, we are barely in time!”
The gunman wheeled about, his face a mask of incredulous surprise. Phillip screamed, “Be careful!” but his admonition was unnecessary.
Porthos’ huge fist crashed into the gunman’s face. The man hit the floor in a sprawling crash and the gun slipped from his nervous fingers.
Porthos stepped over the thug’s body and Athos and Aramis followed him into the room.
Athos shook his head slowly.
“My dear boy,” he murmured to D’Artagnan, “won’t you ever learn to keep out of trouble.”
D’Artagnan smiled, turning to his companions, and the Major seized that opportunity to make a break. Ducking swiftly he scooped up the foil that D’Artagnan had dropped and bolted for the door.
Athos was the only person who stood between him and freedom.
“Out of my way!” Lanser snarled.
Athos was still wearing his pin-stripe suit, but his sword was buckled at this waist. He dropped back a step and his blade flashed into his hand.
“I’m afraid I don’t like your tone,” he said quietly.
Lanser lunged forward, his blade driving for Athos’ heart, but Athos slipped aside easily. Lanser, his eyes glaring with mad frustration, grabbed the red-haired girl by the waist and swung her around in front of him as a shield.
“Now,” he grated. “Stand aside!”
With his sword extended he lunged forward again, shielding his body with the girl’s.
Athos murmured, “You are making my task a bit more difficult.”
His smile was like the flicker of light on a rapier as he feinted to the left, drawing the Major in that direction.
His move back to the right was quicker than an eye could follow. The sword in his hand — the coolest, most daring hand in all France — leaped forward like a bolt of flashing light and Major Lanser stiffened involuntarily, a cry breaking from his lips. For an instant his side had been exposed, and in that instant the blade of Athos had found its mark.