I came at last to the cottage. Selim was waiting for me at the edge of the forest. I confess that when I saw him I felt in my heart something like that which a wolf feels when he sees his prey. We looked each other in the eyes threateningly, and with curiosity. Selim had changed in those two days; he had grown thin and ugly, but maybe it only seemed to me that he had grown ugly, his eyes gleamed feverishly, the corners of his mouth quivered. We went immediately to the depth of the forest, but we did not speak a word the whole way. At last, when I found a little opening among the pines, I stopped, and asked,-- "Here. Agreed?" He nodded his head and began to unbutton his coat, so as to take it off before the duel. "Choose!" said I, pointing to the pistols and the sabre. He pointed to a sabre which he had with him: it was Turkish, a Damascus blade, much curved toward the point. Meanwhile I threw off my coat; he followed my example, but first he took a letter from his pocket and said,-- "If I die, I beg to give this to Panna Hania." "I will not receive it." "This is not a confession; it is an explanation." "Agreed! I will take it." Thus speaking, we rolled up our shirt-sleeves. Only now did my heart begin to beat more vigorously. At last Selim seized the hilt of his sabre, straightened himself, took the position of a fencer, challenging, proud, and holding the sabre higher than his head, said briefly,-- "I am ready." I struck on him at once, and so impetuously that he had to retreat a number of steps, and he received my blows on his sabre with difficulty; he answered, however, each blow with a blow, and with such swiftness that stroke and answer were heard almost simultaneously. A flush covered his face; his nostrils distended; his eyes stared out slantingly in Tartar fashion, and began to cast lightning. For a while there was nothing to be heard but the clink of blades, the dry sound of steel, and the whistling breath of our breasts.