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Barbara Harding devoted her energies to thrusting and cutting at those who tried

to press past the mucker, that they might take him from behind. The battle could

not last long, so unequal were the odds. She saw the room beyond filled with

surging warriors all trying to force their way within reach of the great white man

who battled like some demigod of old in the close, dark, evil warren of the daimio.

She shot a side glance at the man. He was wonderful! The fire of battle had

transformed him. No longer was he the sullen, sulky, hulking brute she had first

known upon the Halfmoon. Instead, huge, muscular, alert, he towered above his

pygmy antagonists, his gray eyes gleaming, a half-smile upon his strong lips.

She saw the long sword, wielded awkwardly in his unaccustomed hands, beat

down the weapons of his skilled foemen by the very ferocity of its hurtling attack.

She saw it pass through a man's shoulder, cleaving bone and muscle as if they

had been cheese, until it stopped two-thirds across its victim's body, cutting him

almost in two.

She saw a samurai leap past her champion's guard in an attempt to close upon

him with a dagger, and when she had rushed forward to thwart the fellow's

design she had seen Byrne swing his mighty left to the warrior's face with a blow

that might well have felled an ox. Then another leaped into closer quarters and

she saw Byrne at the same instant bury his sword in the body of a dark-visaged

devil who looked more Malay than Jap, and as the stricken man fell she saw the

hilt of the mucker's blade wrenched from his grip by the dead body of his foe. The

samurai who had closed upon Byrne at that instant found his enemy unarmed,

and with a howl of delight he struck full at the broad chest with his long, thin

dagger.

But Billy Byrne was not to be dispatched so easily. With his left forearm he

struck up the hand that wielded the menacing blade, and then catching the

fellow by the shoulder swung him around, grasped him about the waist and

lifting him above his head hurled him full in the faces of the swordsmen who were

pressing through the narrow doorway.

Almost simultaneously a spear shot through a tiny opening in the ranks before

Billy Byrne, and with a little gasp of dismay the huge fellow pitched forward upon

his face. At the same instant a shot rang out behind Barbara Harding, and

Theriere leaped past her to stand across the body of the fallen mucker.

With the sound of the shot a samurai sank to the floor, dead, and the others,

unaccustomed to firearms, drew back in dismay. Again Theriere fired point-blank

into the crowded room, and this time two men fell, struck by the same bullet.

Once more the warriors retreated, and with an exultant yell Theriere followed up

The Mucker