“He is free,” said a man, in awe.
“The chains were tampered with,” said another.
Even the pit master seemed in awe. He no longer struggled.
Those who were with him seemed scarcely now to restrain him. The officer of Treve, too, seemed staggered by what he had seen. His sword, which had been pried from his hand, lay at his feet.
“He cannot escape,” said the leader of the strangers, calmly. “Kill him.”
The peasant, now that his hands were free from the wall, took, with both hands, the chain which was on his left wrist, that to which the block of stone was still bolted.
He lifted the stone easily from the floor. It swung on the chain, about six inches from the floor. He was bent over. He was breathing heavily.
None of the men cared to advance.
Gito crept behind the men to our left, and crouched down, by the wall.
The peasant suddenly swung the great stone on its chain about his head in a wicked whirling circle. He stepped out a yard from the wall. The men drew back. Some went to the side. Then the peasant retreated to the wall. His eyes, wolflike, looked to the left and right. He would not permit them behind him. If he should strike a man, of course, that might stop the stone, or even tangle the chain, providing the others with the opportunity they needed, blades ready, to close. But none cared, it seemed, to be the first to tread within the orbit of that fierce satellite, that primitive, improvised weapon.
“You, you,” said the leader of the strangers to two of his men. “Sheath your swords, set your bows.”
The two men, protected behind their brethren, unslung their bows. Some such weapons are set by a windlass, but those these men carried were more swiftly prepared for fire. It is useful in cramped spaces, in close quarters, in room to room fighting. It is an alert weapon, responsive to the trigger; its opportunity need not be more prolonged than the movement of the target across a passageway; it is a patient weapon; it can wait quietly, motionlessly, for a long time, for its target to appear. The two new bowmen set their feet in the bow stirrup, grasping the cable with two hands, one on each side of the guide.
Suddenly, crying out, realizing somehow, in some dark part of that simple brain, in some instinctive fashion, that he had not a moment to spare, risking all, heedless of his back, swinging the stone about his head, the peasant chains flying about his ankles, charged toward the bowmen. His action, as sudden as it was, took the black-tunicked men by surprise. They fell back before him. The one bowman, his foot locked in the stirrup, looked up only in time to see the great stone whipping toward him, the other was protected by his fellow who received the blow, but, he, too, his foot in the stirrup, fell awkwardly to the side. He cried out in pain. “Blades! Close with him! Close with him!” cried the leader of the strangers. But the stone on its chain, the peasant whirling with it, spun about and about. I saw flesh fly from the thigh of one of the men. He staggered back. Blood splashed on the man to the right of the officer of Treve, he holding his right arm. The sword lay still at the officer’s feet. The pit master suddenly, again began to struggle. The six men about him tightened their grip, clinging to him tenaciously. They clung to him like dogs to a bull. He struggled to throw them from him. The bowman who had been struck lay to one side, his head awry, too far back, still in the helmet, half torn from the body. Swords darted at the peasant but none reached him, he protected in the whriling shield of chain and stone. And then the stone struck against the side of the portal and the stone burst from the portal, a cubic foot of wall there broken from its place, but the stone, too, on the chain, shattered, splitting at the bolts, and fell in two halves away. The chain on his wrists flew about. That to which the ring and plate was attached, bolts still on the plate, struck a fellow across the face, lashing him back. And then the peasant was back again, at bay, against the wall. We cried out, we sobbed with fear. Gito was hiding himself in straw to the left of the portal as one would enter.
“The stone is done now,” said the leader of the black-tunicked men, himself now straightened up, lowering the sword he had held before his face, two hands on the hilt. “The chains are nothing.”
The peasant was breathing heavily. The door was in front of him, but men with blades blocked his passage.
“Four will advance,” said the leader of the strangers. “You, and you, will engage,” he said, to two of his men, near him, in the right side of the room, as one would enter it.
“And you, and you,” said the lieutenant, to two of the men on his side of the room, the left, as one would enter.
The peasant looked wildly about himself.
He could not defend himself, he substantially defenseless now, against these blades. The chain might be evaded, or it might be stopped or turned, or tangled, by a blade. Too, as he would move to defend himself on one side, the other would close.
“He is dead,” said the leader of the strangers, quietly.
Suddenly the officer of Treve kicked the sword at his feet, that which had been earlier pried from his hand, toward the peasant. It slid across the stone. The peasant looked down at it.
“Position to advance,” said the leader of the strangers.
The four men formed, one ahead on each side.
“Pick it up!” said the officer of Treve.
The pit master, held by the men at him, looked to the officer of Treve, wildly, gratefully, elatedly.
The peasant bent down and picked up the blade. He looked at it, almost as if he did not understand such a thing. I supposed he may never had had such a thing in his hand before.
The four men prepared to advance looked to one another, and to their captain.
“You do not understand such a thing,” said the leader of the strangers to the peasant. “You are of the peasants. It is not for your caste. Your weapon is the great staff, perhaps the great bow. You are of the Peasants. You do not know that weapon. You are of the Peasants. Remember you are of the Peasants.”
“Yes,” said the giant before us. “I do not know this thing I am of the Peasants.”
“Advance,” said the leader of the strangers to the four men.
I gasped.
The first darting stroke toward the peasant had been parried smartly.
I had scarcely followed either the thrust or its turning. That single, sharp ringing of steel seemed to linger in the cell.
“Do you call this a weapon?” asked the peasant. “It is only a knife. Yet it is quick. It is very quick.”
“Strike!” said the leader of the strangers.
Another man lunged forward and again the blow was turned, almost as though one might blink an eye, by reflex.
“I do not know this thing,” said the peasant, looking at the blade, curiously.
Another fellow thrust but this time the thrust was not merely parried. The attacker lay to the peasant’s right, his knees drawn up. He coughed blood into the straw.
“But it is quick,” said the peasant. “It is quick.”
“Attack, attack!” cried the leader of the strangers.
Steel rang out by the wall of the cell. I think I heard blades cross seven or eight times.
Black-tunicked men drew back. Another of their fellows lay in the straw.
“He is a master,” said a man, in awe.
Suddenly the pit master, with a great cry, with a great surge of strength, like a moving mountain, like a pain-crazed, maddened bull, threw from the black-tunicked men who held him, as the mountain might have uprooted trees and tumbled boulders to the valley below, as the bull, rearing up, tossing its head, might have shaken itself free of besetting dogs.