I stood petrified, measuring him. He was lightly built and slender. He
had a manner as glittering as his weapon, and a pair of remarkably cool
and clear gray eyes. His picturesqueness seemed wasted on mere flesh
and blood it was so perfect. Coatless, but wearing a shirt of the finest
linen, he looked like some old French duelist and ought, I felt, to be
gazing at me, rapier in hand, from a gilt-framed canvas on the wall.
In the brief pause before he spoke I gathered some further data. He was
a sick man and he had recently been wounded; at present he was keeping
up by sheer courage, not by strength. His lips were pressed in a
straight line, his eyes were shadowed, and his pallor was ghastly.
Finally, he was wearing his left arm in a sling across his breast.
"Monsieur," he now enunciated clearly, "will raise both hands and keep
them lifted. Monsieur sees, doubtless, that I am in no state for a
wrestling-match. For that very reason he must take all pains not to
forget himself--for should he stir, however slightly, I grieve to say
that I must shoot.
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