As it is, I wash my hands of all responsibility, and by all means let us engage, sirs." They disposed themselves accordingly, Gaubert engaging Courthon, on Garnache's right hand, and Garnache himself falling on guard to receive the attack of Sanguinetti.

The jeers and murmurs that had been rising from the ever-growing crowd that swarmed about the outskirts of the place fell silent as the clatter of meeting swords rang out at last.

And then, scarce were they engaged when a voice arose, calling angrily: "Hold, Sanguinetti! Wait!" A big, broad-shouldered man, in a suit of homespun and a featherless hat, thrust his way rudely trough the crowd and broke into the space within the belt of trees.

The combatants had fallen apart at this commanding cry, and the newcomer now dashed forward, flushed and out of breath as if with running.
"Vertudieu! Sanguinetti," he swore, and his manner was half-angry, half-bantering; "do you call this friendship ?" "My dear Francois" returned the foreigner, "you arrive most inopportunely." "And is that all the greeting you have for me ?" Looking more closely, Garnache thought that he recognized in him one of Sanguinetti's companions of yesternight.
"But do you not see that I am engaged ?" "Ay; and that is my grievance that you should be engaged upon such an affair, and that I should have no share in it.

It is to treat me like a lackey, and have the right to feel offended.