As that experienced swordsman, General Pepper, standing with stick extended, viewed the fight, it seemed to him that Haggard, by remaining purely on the defensive, ran a considerable risk, but that was Haggard's business. Perhaps after all his principal meant to take a flesh wound, and so end the matter. "But," thought the general to himself, "he'll find out his mistake, if that dancing devil gets in one of his vicious thrusts." Spunyarn looked on, and the perspiration streamed from his face. De Kerguel was no less excited, but he preserved a calm exterior. More than two minutes had now elapsed since the combat had first commenced. These things take longer to tell than to do. Suddenly, in an instant, Barbiche made a furious lunge at his opponent; the Englishman parried it with ease, dropping his point lower than usual. As if blind to the consequences, the Frenchman rushed forward with a short sharp cry, his sword passed across Haggard's chest without touching him, but poor Barbiche had literally impaled himself on his adversary's extended weapon. His sabre dropped from his hand. He flung both his arms high in air, giving one bitter shriek. His face assumed the expression of one enduring intense torture, and then was calm again. The body, for he was dead, _slipped off_ Haggard's sword in a heap at his feet. Haggard flung his weapon to the ground, and all four men crowded round the corpse. "He is stone dead," said the surgeon. There was a solemn silence. "Save yourselves, gentlemen," at length cried De Kerguel. "I will see to my unfortunate friend. It was his own fault and _mine_," he said with a sigh. The Englishmen saluted. Haggard resumed his garments, and they hurried from the field, unobserved and unmolested. Next morning Rome rang with the affair; by noon all three Englishmen were safely over the frontier. CHAPTER XII. THE VILLA LAMBERT. Twenty-four hours at a Genevese hotel were got through by Georgie and her cousin without difficulty. "I do think," said Lucy, "that Reginald might have brought us here himself. I confess that a _tête-à-tête_ of two women is dull; when they are almost sisters, as a rule it's duller still; though the dulness is frequently enlivened by a pitched battle. Georgie, why are you not of a pugnacious disposition? My fingers literally itch to box some one's ears; as for Hephzibah, I've no patience with her." "I noticed that you had set her crying again, Lucy, for about the tenth time to-day."