time to dodge, but his sword-hand moved like lightning, the blades rang together, and the flying sabre was swept high into the air to fall clattering almost at the mouth of the tunnel. By which time I was on him, fists and cold feet flying, grappling him, and down we went together in a tangle of limbs, Flashy roaring and Willem spitting curses. I took a wild punch at his head and missed, yelping as my knuckles struck the stone, and as I rolled away blind with pain he was on his feet, cutting down at me. His sword struck sparks within an inch of my head, I scrambled on to all fours and came erect—and there he was, extending himself in a lunge that there was no avoiding, and I died in that split second as his point sank home in my unprotected body.
What is it like to be run through? I’ll tell you. For an instant, nothing. Then a hideous, tearing agony for another instant—and then nothing again, as you see the blade withdrawn and the blood welling on your shirt, for the pain is lost in shock and disbelief as your eyes meet your assailant’s. It’s a long moment, that, in which you realise that you ain’t dead, and that he’s about to launch another thrust to finish you—and it’s remarkable how swiftly you can move then, with a hole clean through you from front to back, about midway between your navel and your hip, and spouting gore like a pump. (It don’t hurt half as much as a shot through the hand, by the way; that’s the real gyp.)
Well, I moved, as Starnberg whirled up his sabre for a cut, and the pain returned with such a sickening spasm that I was near paralysed, and what should have been a backward spring became an agonised stagger, clutching my belly and squealing (appropriately) like a stuck pig. His cut came so close that the point ripped my sleeve, and then the back of my thighs struck something solid, and I went arse over tip into one of the bogie trucks standing on the rails—and the force of my arrival must have jolted its ancient wheels loose from the dust of ages, for the dam' thing began to move.
For a moment all the sense was jarred out of me, and then Willem shouted—with laughter!—and through waves of pain I remembered that the rails ran slightly downwards from the tunnel mouth, and that the bogie must be rolling, slowly at first but with increasing momentum, towards that ghastly oubliette where the rails ended.
If I’ve sinned in my time, wouldn’t you say I’ve paid for it? There I was, on the broad of my back, legs in the air, leaking blood by the pint with my guts on Are, confined by the sides of the truck, helpless as a beetle on a card as I trundled towards certain death. Bellowing with pain and panic, I grabbed for the top of one side, missed my hold, regained it with a frantic clutch, and heaved myself up bodily with an agonising wrench to my wound. I had a glimpse of Willem shouting in glee—I won’t swear he didn’t flourish his sabre in a farewell salute, the gloating kite —and as I tried to heave myself clear the confounded truck lurched, throwing me off balance, it was gathering speed, bumping and swaying over the last few yards of track, and as the front wheels went over the edge with a grating crash I tumbled over the side, my shoulder hit the stone with a numbing jar—and my legs were kicking in empty air! I flailed my arms for a hold on the stone, and by the grace of God my left hand fell on the nearside rail, and I was hanging on for dear life, my chest on the stone, my bleeding belly below the brink of the chasm, and the rest of me dangling into the void.
Far below the falling truck was crashing against the rock walls, but I’ll swear it made less noise than I did. Feeling my grip slide on the worn wood, I fairly made the welkin ring, striving and failing to haul myself up, getting my numbed right forearm on to the surface, but powerless to gain another inch, my whole right side throbbing with pain … and Willem was striding towards me, sabre in hand, grinning with unholy delight as he came to a halt above me. And then he hunkered down, and (it’s gospel true) spoke the words which were a catchphrase of my generation, employed facetiously when some terrible crisis was safely past:
'Will you have nuts or a cigar, sir?'
I doubt if the noise I made in reply was a coherent request for assistance, for my sweating grasp was slipping on the rail, I was near fainting with my wound, and already falling in tortured imagination into the stygian bowels of the Saltzkammergut. But he got the point, I’m sure, for he stared into my eyes, and then that devilish, mocking smile spread over his young face … and what he did then you may believe or not, as you will, but if you doubt me … well, you didn’t know Willem von Starnberg, or Rudi, for that matter.
He rested on one knee, laid down his sabre, and his right hand closed on my left wrist like a vice, even as my fingers slipped from the rail. With his left hand he brought his cigarette case from his breast pocket, selected one of his funereal smokes, pushed it between my yammering lips, struck a match, and said amiably:
'No cigar, alas … but a last cigarette for the condemned man, what?'
You may say it was the limit of diabolic cruelty, and I’ll not dispute it. Or you may say he was stark crazy, and I’ll not dispute that, either. At the moment I had no thoughts on the matter, for I was barely conscious, with no will except that which kept my right forearm on the stone, knowing that when it slipped I’d be hanging there by his grip on my other wrist alone … until he let go. I know he said something about cigars being bad for the wind anyway, and then: 'Gad, but you do give a fellow a run for his money,' and on those words he gripped my collar, and with one almighty heave deposited me limp, gasping, and bleeding something pitiful, on the floor of the cave.
For several minutes I couldn’t stir, except to tremble violently, and when I had breath to spare from groaning and wheezing and lamenting my punctured gut, which was now more numb than painful, I know I babbled a blessing or two on his head, which I still maintain was natural. It didn’t suit him a bit, though; he stood looking vexed and then flung away the gasper and demanded: 'Why the devil can’t you die clean?' to which I confess I had no ready answer. If I had a thought it was that having saved me, he was now bound to spare me, and I guess the same thing was occurring to him and putting him out of temper. But I can’t say what was passing in his mind— indeed, to this day I can’t fathom him at all. I can only tell you what was said and done that morning in that godforsaken salt-mine above Ischl.
'It ain’t a reprieve, you know!' cries he.
'What d’ye mean?' says I.
'I mean that it’s still the Union Jack for you, Flashman!' retorts he—the only time, I think, he’d ever used my surname formal-like, and with a sneer he added words he could only have heard from Rudi. 'The game ain’t finished yet, play-actor!' Then he snapped something I didn’t catch about how if he had let me fall down the cleft I’d likely have found a way out at the bottom. 'So you’ll go the way I choose, d’ye see? When you’re done pukin' and snivellin' you’ll get up and take that sabre and stand your ground for a change, my Rugby hero, ’cos if you don’t, I’ll … Wer ist das?'
My wail of protest was drowned by his shouted challenge, and I saw he was staring towards the tunnel mouth, suddenly on his guard, crouched like a great cat—and my heart leaped as I saw why.
Someone was standing just within the tunnel mouth, motionless and silent, a dark figure clad in close-fitting shirt and britches and peaked cap, but too much in shadow for the features to be made out. Seconds passed without reply, and Willem started forward a couple of paces and stopped, shouting again: 'Who are you? What d’ye want?'
Still there came no reply, but as the echoes resounded from the cavern walls and died away in whispers, the figure stepped swiftly forward, stooped to retrieve my fallen sabre, and straightened again in a stance that left no doubt of his intentions, for he stood like an epee fighter at rest between bouts, left hand on hip, point inclined downwards above the advanced right foot. Willem swore in astonishment and shot a glance at me, lying bemused and bleeding, but I was as baffled as he—and my hopes were shooting skywards, for this mysterious apparition was Salvation, surely, issuing an unspoken challenge to my oppressor, and I was mustering breath to bawl for help when:
'Speak up; damn you!' cries Willem. 'Who are you?' The newcomer said not a word, but tilted up his point in invitation.
'Well enough, then!' cries Willem, and laughed. 'Whoever you are, we’ll have two for the price o' one, what?' And he went in at a run, cutting left and right at the head, but the newcomer side-stepped nimbly, parrying and riposting like an Angelo, so help me, tossing aside the peaked cap to clear his vision—and as the light from above fell full on his features I absolutely cried out in amazement. Either this was all a dream, or the horrors I’d endured had turned my brain, for I was staring at a stark impossibility, a hallucination. The face of the swordsman, fresh and youthful under its mop of auburn curls, was one that I’d last seen smiling wantonly up at me from a lace pillow five years ago: the face of my little charmer of Berlin: Caprice.
It was mad, ridiculous, couldn’t be true, and I was seeing things—until Willem’s startled oath told me I wasn’t. The graceful lines of the figure in its male costume, the dainty shift of the small feet, as much as the pretty little face so unexpectedly revealed, fairly shouted her sex, and he checked in mid-cut and sprang back exclaiming as she came gliding in at speed, boot stamping and point darting at his throat. It was sheer disbelief, not gallantry, that took him aback, for there’s no more chivalry in a Starnberg than there is in me; he recovered in an instant and
