In the Quarter | Page 7

ribs, which sent him reeling
against Carleton. Clifford knocked two men down in as many blows,
and, springing back, stood guard over Thaxton until he could struggle
to his feet again. Elliott got a sounding thwack on the nose, which he
neatly returned, adding one on the eye for interest. Gethryn and
Carleton fought back to back. Rhodes began by half strangling a son of
the Commune and then flung him bodily among his howling
compatriots.

"Good Heavens," gasped Rhodes, "we can't keep this up!" And raising
his voice, he cried with all the force of his lungs, "Help! This way,
police!" A shot answered him, and a man, clapping his hands to his
face, tilted heavily forward, the blood spurting between his fingers.
Then a terrible cry arose, a din in which the Americans caught the
clanging of steel and the neighing of horses. A man was hurled
violently against Gethryn, who, losing in turn his balance, staggered
and fell. Rising to his knees, he saw a great foam-covered horse rearing
almost over him, and a red-faced rider in steel helmet and tossing
plume slashing furiously among the crowd. Next moment he was
dragged to his feet and back into the flying mob.
"Look out," panted Thaxton, "the cavalry -- they've charged -- run!"
Gethryn glanced over his shoulder. All along the edge of the frantic,
panic-stricken crowd the gleaming crests of the cavalry surged and
dashed like a huge wave of steel.
Cries, groans, and curses rose and were drowned in the thunder of the
charging horses and the clashing of weapons.
"Spy!" screamed a voice in his ear. Gethryn turned, but the fellow was
legging it for safety.
Suddenly he saw a woman who, pushed and crowded by the mob,
stumbled and fell. In a moment he was by her side, bent over to raise
her, was hurled upon his face, rose blinded by dust and half-stunned,
but dragging her to her feet with him.
Swept onward by the rush, knocked this way and that, he still managed
to support the dazed woman, and by degrees succeeded in controlling
his own course, which he bent toward the Obelisk. As he neared the
goal of comparative safety, exhausted, he suffered himself and the
woman to be carried on by the rush. Then a blinding flash split the air
in front, and the crash of musketry almost in his face hurled him back.
Men threw up their hands and sank in a heap or spun round and pitched
headlong. For a moment he swayed in the drifting smoke. A blast of

hot, sickening air enveloped him. Then a dull red cloud seemed to settle
slowly, crushing, grinding him into the earth.
Three
When Gethryn unclosed his eyes the dazzling sunlight almost blinded
him. A thousand grotesque figures danced before him, a hot red vapor
seemed to envelop him. He felt a dull pain in his ears and a numb
sensation about the legs. Gradually he recalled the scene that had just
passed; the flying crowd lashed by that pitiless iron scourge; the cruel
panic; the mad, suffocating rush; and then that crash of thunder which
had crushed him.
He lay quite still, not offering to move. A strange languor seemed to
weigh down his very heart. The air reeked with powder smoke. Not a
breath was stirring.
Presently the numbness in his knees changed to a hot, pricking throb.
He tried to move his legs, but found he could not. Then a sudden
thought sent the blood with a rush to his heart. Perhaps he no longer
had any legs! He remembered to have heard of legless men whose
phantom members caused them many uncomfortable sensations. He
certainly had a dull pain where his legs belonged, but the question was,
had he legs also? The doubt was too much, and with a faint cry he
struggled to rise.
"The devil!" exclaimed a voice close to his head, and a pair of startled
eyes met his own. " The devil!" repeated the owner of the eyes, as if to
a apostrophize some particular one. He was a bird-like little fellow,
with thin canary-colored hair and eyebrows and colorless eyes, and he
was seated upon a campstool about two feet from Gethryn's head.
He blinked at Gethryn. "These Frenchmen," said he, "have as many
lives as a cat."
"Thanks!" said Gethryn, smiling faintly.
"An Englishman! The devil!" shouted the pale-eyed man, hopping in

haste from his campstool and dropping a well-thumbed sketching-block
as he did so.
"Don't be an ass," suggested Gethryn; "you'd much better help me to
get up."
"Look here," cried the other, "how was I to know you were not done
for?"
"What's the matter with me?" said Gethryn. "Are my -- my legs gone?"
The little man glanced at Gethryn's