He greeted them, through that infernal
furnace, with laughter, and wide, steady eyes. At least it seemed
laughter, for the mouth was agape and the lips grinned back, but there
was no sound from the lips and no light in the fixed eyes. Laughter
indeed it was, but it was the laughter of death, as if the soul of the
man, in dying, recognized its natural wild element and had burst into
convulsive mirth. So he sat there, untouched as yet by the wide river
of fire, chuckling at his destiny. The wall of fire closed across the
doorway again and the work of red ruin went on with a crashing of
timbers from the upper part of the building.
As that living wall shut solidly, Jacqueline leaped forward, shouting,
like a man, words of hope and rescue; Pierre caught her barely in
time--a precarious grasp on the wrist from which she nearly wrenched
herself free and gained the entrance to the fire. But the jerk threw
her off balance for the least fraction of an instant, and the next
moment she was safe in his arms.
Safe? He might as well have held a wildcat, or captured with his bare
hands a wild eagle, strong of talon and beak.
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