The Time Mirror Part 17

"Look! He reaches for his knife!" whooped the baron. "He would protect his sweetheart!"

The guardsmen behind him joined in his roar of laughter.

Something came over Mark Carter in that moment. Something at once cold and deadly, and hotly, fiercely pa.s.sionate. He felt a kinship to all earth's fighting madmen--the Malay, run amok; the Viking, gone berserk; the Arab, charging through h.e.l.l to paradise.

Like a human projectile he launched himself, straight for the throat of Baron Morriere!

"Ai!"

It was not a word, that sound that came from the n.o.ble's throat. No.

There was something more primitive than that about it.

It was terror, incarnate.

Before the man could move, Mark's fingers were clutching at him, tearing his clothing and his flesh. Again he screamed.

As one possessed, Mark jerked him from the bosom of his guardsmen.

Hurled him bodily across the room, to slam against the farthest wall with a crash that echoed through the ancient wing.

But now the guardmen's paralysis was broken. They surged forward as one man.

"Jacques! Look out!"

Elaine's scream lent strength to her lover's arms. He slammed the door in the face of the oncoming fighters. Half a dozen swords stabbed deep into its wood, so closely were they upon him. He hurled himself at the portal. Forced it shut by sheer desperation. Slammed home its triple bolts.

He turned, then, his breath coming in great, sobbing gasps.

Baron Morriere had lurched to his feet. His right hand gripped a sword, his left a dagger.

"You'll die yet, you dog!" he snarled. "I'll spit you on my sword like a pig above a bed of coals!"

The flames of the pit showed in Mark's eyes.

"And I'll see _you_ in h.e.l.l," he grated.

With a curse of contempt, the baron charged.

Mark sprang aside.

Again the other rushed to the attack.

Once more Mark dodged. But now desperation gleamed in his eyes. He was unarmed, helpless. One slip, one misstep, and that cruel blade would pin him to the wall!

Another rush. Another escape. But this time the blade had come close.

Mark's shirt was ripped; his shoulder bleeding from a long scratch.

Even worse: from the end of the room came the sound of splintering wood as the guardsmen smashed in the panels of the door. A moment more and they would be upon him!

Again the deadly play of wits. And then, suddenly, Mark found himself penned in a corner. Trapped. The baron faced him, panting, his face alight with evil joy. And beyond the n.o.ble, on her bed of straw, Elaine Duchard stared at her lover with horror-straught eyes.

"Die, you dog!"

The baron lunged. His gleaming sword stabbed for Mark's vitals. The unarmed man's teeth clenched to the take the fatal blow.

It never came!

One moment the baron was charging. The next, falling.

"Elaine!"

For the girl's white body was sprawled across the floor. Her thin hands still clutched the baron's ankle.

The next instant her lover was at the n.o.ble's throat. His fists beat a tattoo of mayhem on the other's face. Forced him back against a window-sill. Beat him to a senseless, bleeding pulp.

"Jacques!"

He whirled. Saw the door at the far end of the room buckle and give way.

With one sweep of his arms, he sent the baron's body toppling through the window. Falling down ... down ... down, to death on the stone-slab walk three stories below.

Even as he did it, Mark was leaping toward Elaine. He caught her in his arms and lunged for the room's second door. He made it bare inches ahead of the guardsmen's swords.

This door was lighter. Already it rattled under the blows of the baron's men.

"Let me die, Jacques!" Elaine whispered. "I know I am going. You need not try to save me."

"Don't say it!" Mark's voice was a jagged knife of command. "You can't die now. Don't say it!"

He carried her, then, to where the picture Gustav Jerbette had painted stood. A strange picture, for that day and age, for it portrayed Mark Carter and his fiancee, Elaine Duchard, standing side by side in front of a building clearly identifiable as Professor Duchard's laboratory.

And the pair were dressed, not in the garb of eighteenth century France, but in that of twentieth century America.

"Shut your eyes, Elaine!"

Wearily, the dying girl obeyed.

With one savage jerk, Mark whipped the cover from another stand. A stand on which stood a mirror. A mirror whose surface seemed to ripple in the fading light. A circular mirror, full three feet in diameter. A mirror with a garishly ornate frame.

His hands trembling with feverish haste, Mark adjusted the picture to reflect in the gla.s.s.

Already the door was cracking.

He s.n.a.t.c.hed Elaine from where she lay. Held her half-conscious body before the mirror.

"Open your eyes, Elaine! Open your eyes and look at that girl in the mirror! Concentrate on her, Elaine! _Concentrate!_"