As I ran, I saw an officer in uniform leap from the interior of the
droshka, and draw his sword in preparation for my attack, while his
yemschik, whip in hand, scrambled from the snow, and assumed a
place beside him. They evidently supposed the attack to be of a very
different character than it really was. The wounded horse was
struggling and kicking, and I found time to think of the grave danger
that its hoofs might injure Zara, whom I judged to be unconscious from
fright, or because of the shock; and so, heedless of my own necessities
in undertaking an assault upon the two men who now faced me, I fired a
third bullet into the maddened animal. Then, as I sprang to the attack,
I saw and recognized the man who confronted me, and my heart bounded
with thanksgiving that I had taken that route to the palace. I
recognized Alexis Durnief.
The report of his arrest had been false, or he had managed in some way
to escape; and even then, in that instant of rushing onward upon the
two men, I could not help wondering by what means he had managed to
entice Zara from the house in which she had taken refuge. I had two
bullets remaining in my revolver; at least I thought so, and I raised
it, and pulled the trigger a fourth time, thus placing the yemschik
effectually out of that combat, and rendering it impossible for him
ever to engage in others; and then, when barely ten feet away from the
scoundrelly captain, I leveled the weapon at him and ordered him to
throw down his sword. He laughed derisively, for he was not a coward,
and he knew that death would be far preferable to the fate that would
be his, if he were captured alive.
"So! It is my friend Dubravnik, is it?" he said, insolently, but in a
tone as cool as though he were greeting me in a ballroom. "You have
killed my horses, and my yemschik; why not do the same for me?"
I hesitated.
To shoot a man like that, was against every impulse of my soul; and yet
he was armed with a weapon as deadly as mine, if once I should get
within reach of its point. I possessed none with which to meet him on
even ground. But, inside the droshka, was unquestionably the
unconscious form of the woman I loved. The occasion was a crisis. There
could be no temporizing. Zara must be rescued.
"Throw down your sword, or I will certainly kill you!" I commanded him,
again.
"Kill," he replied, laconically. There was no other way, and I pulled
the trigger.
There was no report. Durnief did not fall, as the horses, and his
yemschik had done. He stood unharmed, for the cartridge was bad,
or the chamber of my revolver was unloaded. Instantly he understood
that he had me at his mercy, and with a deadly smile upon his face he
leaped forward to run me through.