No firing had replied to that of the guards, and yet their way was stopped by a heap of dead bodies--they literally walked in blood.

Porthos was still behind his pillar.

The captain, illumining with trembling pine-torch this frightful carnage, of which he in vain sought the cause, drew back towards the pillar behind which Porthos was concealed.

Then a gigantic hand issued from the shade, and fastened on the throat of the captain, who uttered a stifle rattle; his stretched-out arms beating the air, the torch fell and was extinguished in blood.

A second after, the corpse of the captain dropped close to the extinguished torch, and added another body to the heap of dead which blocked up the passage.