It was not a difficult matter for Lord Lethbridge and Lady Rule to pursue their newly declared friendship. Both being of the haut ton they visited the same houses, met, quite by chance, at Vauxhall, at Marylebone, even at Astley’s Amphitheatre, whither Horatia dragged the unwilling Miss Charlotte Winwood to see the still new wonder of the circus.
“But,” said Charlotte, “I must confess that I can discover nothing to entertain or elevate the mind in the spectacle of noble horses performing the steps of a minuet, and I cannot conceal from you, Horatia, that I find something singularly repugnant in the notion that the Brute Creation should be obliged to imitate the actions of Humanity.”
Mr Arnold Gisborne, their chosen escort, appeared to be much struck by this exposition, and warmly felicitated Miss Winwood on her good sense.
At which moment Lord Lethbridge, who had quite by accident taken it into his head to visit the Amphitheatre on this particular evening, entered the box, and after a brief interchange of civilities with Miss Winwood and Mr Gisborne, took the vacant chair beside Horatia and proceeded to engage her in conversation.
Under cover of the trumpets which heralded the entrance into the ring of a performer who was advertised on the bill to jump over a garter fifteen feet from the ground, at the same time firing off two pistols, Horatia said reproachfully: “I sent you a c-card for it, but you did not come to my hurricane-party, sir. That was not very friendly of you, now w-was it?”
He smiled. “I do not think my Lord Rule would exactly welcome my presence in his house, ma’am.”
Her face hardened at that, but she replied lightly enough: “Oh, you n-need not put yourself about for that, sir. My lord does not interfere with m-me, or—or I with him. Shall you be at the ball at Almack’s Rooms on Friday? I have promised M-Mama I will take Charlotte.”
“Happy Charlotte!” said his lordship.
Almost any right-minded young female would have echoed his words, but Miss Winwood was at that very moment confiding to Mr Gisborne her dislike of such frivolous amusements.
“I own,” agreed Mr Gisborne, “that this present rage for dancing is excessive, yet I believe Almack’s to be a very genteel club, the balls not in the least exceptionable, such as those held at Ranelagh and Vauxhall Gardens. Indeed, I believe that since Carlisle House was given up the general ton of these entertainments is much raised above what it was.”
“I have heard,” said Charlotte with a blush, “of masquerades and ridottos from which all Refinement and Decorum—but I will not say more.”
Happily for Miss Winwood no ball at Almack’s Rooms was ever sullied by any absence of propriety. The club, which was situated in King Street, was in some sort an off-shoot of Almack’s in Pall Mall. It was so exclusive that no one hovering hopefully on the fringe of Society could ever hope for admittance. It had been founded by a coterie of ladies headed by Mrs Fitzroy and Lady Pembroke, and for the sum of ten guineas, a very modest subscription, a ball and a supper were given once a week there for three months of the year. Almack himself, with his Scotch accent and his bag-wig, waited at supper, while Mrs Almack, dressed in her best saque, made tea for the noble company. The club had come to be known as the Marriage Mart, a circumstance which induced Lady Winwood to persuade Charlotte into accepting her sister’s invitation. Her own indifferent health made it impossible for her to chaperon Charlotte herself at all the places of entertainment where a young lady making her debut ought to be seen, so she was once more extremely thankful that Horatia was suitably married.
Lord Winwood and his friend Sir Roland Pommeroy, a very fine young buck, were chosen by Horatia as escorts to the ball. Sir Roland expressed himself to be all happiness, but the Viscount was less polite. “Hang you, Horry, I hate dancing!” he objected. “You’ve a score of beaux, all of ’em falling over themselves for the chance of leading you out. Why the plague d’you want me?”
But it seemed that Horatia for some reason best known to herself did want him. Warning her that he had no notion of dancing through the night and would probably end in the card-room, the Viscount gave way. Horatia said, with truth, that she had not the least objection to his playing cards, since no doubt she would find partners enough without him. Had the Viscount realized what particular partner she had in mind he might not have yielded so easily.
As it was, he escorted both his sisters to King Street and performed his duties to his own satisfaction by leading Horatia out for the opening minuet, and going down one of the country dances with Charlotte. After that, seeing his sisters comfortably bestowed in the middle of Horatia’s usual court, he departed in search of liquid refreshment and more congenial entertainment. Not that he expected to derive much enjoyment even in the card-room, for dancing and not gaming being the object of the club stakes would be low, and the company probably unskilled. However, he had caught sight of his friend Geoffrey Kingston when he first arrived, and had no doubt that Mr Kingston would be happy to sit down to a quiet game of piquet.
It was some time before Lord Lethbridge appeared in the ballroom, but he came at last, very handsome in blue satin, and Miss Winwood, who happened to catch sight of him first, instantly recognized the saturnine gentleman who had joined them at Astley’s. When he presently approached Horatia, and Miss Winwoodobserved the friendly, not to say intimate, terms they seemed to be on, misgiving seized her, and she began to fear that Horatia’s frivolity was not confined to the extravagance of her dress, whose great hoop and multitude of ribbons and laces she had already deplored. She contrived to catch Horatia’s eye in a reproving fashion, just as her sister was going off for the second time on Lord Lethbridge’s arm to join the dance.
Horatia chose to ignore this look, but it had not escaped Lethbridge, who said, raising his brows: “Have I offended your sister? I surprised a most unloving light in her eye.”
“W-well,” said Horatia seriously, “it was not very polite in you not to ask her to d-dance this time.”
“But I never dance,” said Lethbridge, leading her into the set.
“S-silly! you are dancing,” Horatia pointed out.
“Ah, with you,” he replied. “That is different.”
They became separated by the movement of the dance, but not before Lethbridge had marked with satisfaction the blush that mounted to Horatia’s cheeks.
She was certainly not displeased. It was quite true that Lethbridge hardly ever danced, and she knew it. She had seen one or two envious glances follow her progress on to the floor and she was far too young not to feel conscious of triumph. Rule might prefer the riper attractions of Caroline Massey, but my Lady Rule would show him and the rest of the Polite World that she could capture a very rare prize on her own account. Quite apart from mere liking, which she undoubtedly felt towards Lethbridge, he was the very man for her present purpose. Such easy conquests as Mr Dashwood, or young Pommeroy, would not answer at all. Lethbridge, with his singed reputation, his faint air of haughtiness, and his supposed heart of marble, was a captive well worth displaying. And if Rule disliked it—why, so much the better!
Lethbridge, perfectly aware of these dark schemes, was playing his cards very skilfully. Far too clever to show an ardency which he guessed would frighten Horatia, he treated her with admiration savoured with the mockery he knew she found tantalizing. His manner was always that of a man many years her senior; he teased her, as in his continued refusal to play cards with her; he would pique her by being unaware of her presence for half an evening, and devoting himself to some other gratified lady.
As they came together again, he said with his bewildering abruptness: “My lady, that patch!”
Her finger stole to the tiny square of black silk at the corner of her eye. “W-why, what, sir?”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Not the Murderous, I beg of you! It won’t do.”
Her eyes twinkled merrily. As she prepared to go down the dance again, she said over her shoulder: “Which then, p-please?”
“The Roguish!” Lethbridge answered.
When the dance ended, and she would have rejoined Charlotte and Sir Roland, he drew her hand through his arm and led her towards the room where the refreshments were laid.
“Does Pommeroy amuse you? He does not me.”
“N-no, but there is Charlotte, and perhaps—”
“Forgive me,” said Lethbridge crisply, “but neither does Charlotte amuse me—Let me fetch you a glass of ratafia.”
He was back in a moment, and handed her a small glass. He stood beside her chair sipping his own claret and looking straight ahead of him in one of his abstracted fits.
Horatia looked up at him, wondering, as she so often did, why he should all at once have lost interest in her.
“Why the Roguish, my lord?”
He glanced down. “The Roguish?”
“You said I must wear the Roguish p-patch.”
“So I did. I was thinking of something else.”
“Oh!” said Horatia, snubbed.
His sudden smile lit his eyes “I was wondering when you would cease to call me so primly “my lord”,” he said.
“Oh!” said Horatia, reviving. “B-but indeed, sir—”
“But indeed, ma’am!”
“W-well, but what should I c-call you?” she asked doubtfully.
“I have a name, my dear. So too have you—a little name that I am going to use, with your leave.”
“I d-don’t believe you c-care whether you have my l-leave or not!” said Horatia.
“Not very much,” admitted his lordship. “Come, shake hands on the bargain, Horry.”
She hesitated, saw him laughing and dimpled responsively. “Oh, very well, R-Robert!”
Lethbridge bent and kissed the hand she had put into his. “I protest I never knew how charming my poor name could sound until this moment,” he said.
“Pho!” said Horatia. “I am very sure any number of ladies have b-been before me with it.”
“But they none of them called me R-Robert,” explained his lordship.
Meanwhile, the Viscount, emerging briefly from the card-room, was obliged to answer a beckoning signal from Miss Winwood. He strolled across the room to her, and asked casually: “Well, Charlotte, what’s to do?”
Charlotte took his arm and made him walk with her towards one of the widow embrasures. “Pelham, I wish you won’t go back to the card-room. I am uneasy on Horry’s account.”
“Why, what’s the little hussy about now?” inquired the Viscount, unimpressed.
“I do not say that it is anything but the thoughtlessness that we, alas, know so well,” said Charlotte earnestly, “but to dance twice in succession with one gentleman and to go out on his arm gives her an air of singularity which I know dear Mama, or indeed Lord Rule, would deprecate.”
“Rule ain’t so strait-laced. Whom has Horry gone off with?”
“With the gentleman whom we met at Astley’s the other evening, I think,” said Charlotte. “His name is Lord Lethbridge.”
“What?” exclaimed the Viscount. “That fellow here? Odd rot him!”
Miss Winwood clasped both hands on his arm. “Then my fears are not groundless? I should not wish to speak ill of one who is indeed scarcely known to me, yet from the moment I set eyes on his lordship I conceived a mistrust of him which his conduct tonight has done nothing to diminish.”
The Viscount scowled darkly. “You did, eh? Well, it ain’t my business, and I’ve warned Horry, but if Rule don’t put his foot down mighty soon he’s not the man I think him, and so you may tell Horry.”
Miss Winwood blinked. “But is that all you mean to do, Pelham?”
“Well, what can I do?” demanded the Viscount. “Do you suppose I’m going to go and snatch Horry from Lethbridge at the sword’s point?”
“But—”
“I’m not,” said the Viscount definitely. “He’s too good a swordsman.” With which unsatisfactory speech he walked off, leaving Miss Winwood greatly disturbed, and not a little indignant.
The Viscount might seem to his sister to treat the matter with callousness, but he was moved to broach the subject to his brother-in-law in what he considered to be a very delicate manner.
Coming out of the card-room at White’s he nearly walked into Rule, and said with great cheerfulness: “Burn it, that’s fortunate. The very man I want!”
“How much, Pelham?” inquired his lordship wearily.
“As a matter of fact I was looking for someone who might lend me some money,” said the Viscount. “But how you rumbled it beats me!”
“Intuition, Pelham, just intuition.”
“Well, lend me fifty pounds and you shall have it back tomorrow. My luck’s going to turn.”
“What makes you think so?” Rule asked, handing over a bill.
The Viscount pocketed it. “Much obliged to you. I’ll swear you’re a good fellow. Why, I’ve been throwing out for the last hour, and a man can’t go on throwing out for ever. Which reminds me, Rule, I’ve something to say to you. Nothing of moment, you understand, but you know what women are, rabbit ’em!”
“None better,” said his lordship. “So you may safely leave the matter in my hands, my dear Pelham.”
“Blister it, you seem to know what I’m going to say before I’ve said it!” complained the Viscount. “Mind you, I warned Horry he was dangerous at the outset. But then, women are such fools!”
“Not only women,” murmured Rule. “Will you do me a favour, Pelham?”
“Anything in the world!” replied the Viscount promptly. “Pleasure!”
“It is quite a small thing,” Rule said. “But I shall stand greatly in your debt if you would refrain in future from—er—warning Horry.”
The Viscount stared. “Just as you say, of course, but I don’t care to see that fellow Lethbridge dancing attendance on my sister, and so I tell you!”
“Ah, Pelham!” The Viscount, who had turned to go back into the card-room, checked, and looked over his shoulder. “Nor do I,” said Rule pensively.
“Oh!” said the Viscount. He had a flash of insight. “Don’t want me to meddle, eh?”
“You see, my dear boy,” said his lordship apologetically, “I am not really such a fool as you think me.”
The Viscount grinned, promised that there should be no meddling and went back to make up for lost time in the card-room. True to his word, he arrived in Grosvenor Square next morning and impressively planked fifty pounds in bills down on the table before Rule. His luck, it seemed, had turned.
Never one to neglect opportunity, he spent a week riotously following his rare good fortune. No less than five bets of his making were entered in the book at White’s; he won four thousand in a night at Pharaoh, lost six at quinze on Wednesday, recovered and arose a winner on Thursday, on Friday walked into the hazard-room at Almack’s and took his seat at the fifty-guinea table.
“What, Pel, I thought you was done up!” exclaimed Sir Roland Pommeroy, who had been present on the disastrous Wednesday.
“Done up? Devil a bit!” replied the Viscount. “My luck’s in.” He proceeded to fix two pieces of leather round his wrist to protect his ruffles. “Laid Finch a pony on Tuesday Sally Danvers would be the lighter of a boy by Monday.”
“Ecod, you’re mad, Pel!” said Mr Fox. “She’s had four girls already!”
“Mad be damned!” quoth the Viscount. “I had the news on the way here. I’ve won.”
“What, she’s never given Danvers an heir at last?” cried Mr Boulby.
“An heir?” said the Viscount scornfully. “Two of ’em! She’s had twins!”
After this amazing intelligence no one could doubt that the signs were extremely propitious for the Viscount. In fact one cautious gentleman removed himself to the quinze-room, where a number of gamesters sat round tables in silence, with masks on their faces to conceal any betraying emotion, and rouleaus of guineas in front of them.
As the night wore on the Viscount’s luck, which had begun by fluctuating in an uncertain fashion, steadied down. He started the evening by twice throwing out three times in succession, a circumstance which induced Mr Fox to remark that the gull-gropers, or money-lenders, who waited in what he called the Jerusalem chamber for him to rise, would find instead a client in his lordship. However, the Viscount soon remedied this set-back by stripping off his coat and putting it on again inside out, a change that answered splendidly, for no sooner was it made than he recklessly pushed three rouleaus into the centre of the table, called a main of five, and nicked it. By midnight his winnings, in the form of rouleaus, bills and several vowels, or notes of hand, fairly littered the stand at his elbow, and Mr Fox, a heavy loser, called for his third bottle.
There were two tables in the hazard-room, both round, and large enough to accommodate upwards of twenty persons. At the one every player was bound by rule to keep not less than fifty guineas before him, at the other the amount was fixed more moderately at twenty guineas. A small stand stood beside each player with a large rim to hold his glass or his teacup and a wooden bowl for the rouleaus. The room was lit by candles in pendent chandeliers, and so bright was the glare that quite a number of gamesters, the Viscount amongst them, wore leather guards bound round their foreheads to protect their eyes. Others, notably Mr Drelincourt, who was feverishly laying and staking odds at the twenty-guinea table, affected straw hats with very broad brims, which served the double purpose of shading their eyes and preventing their wigs from becoming tumbled. Mr Drelincourt’s hat was adorned with flowers and ribands and was held by several other Macaronis to be a vastly pretty affair. He had put a frieze greatcoat in place of his own blue creation, and presented an astonishing picture as he sat alternately sipping his tea and casting the dice. However, as it was quite the thing to wear frieze coats and straw hats at the gaming table, not even his severest critics found anything in his appearance worthy of remark.
For the most part silence broken only by the rattle of the dice and the monotonous drone of the groom-porters’ voices calling the odds brooded over the room, but from time to time snatches of desultory talk broke out. Shortly after one o’clock quite a burst of conversation proceeded from the twenty-guinea table, one of the gamesters having taken it into his head to call the dice in the hope of changing his luck. Someone, while they waited for a fresh bale, had started an interesting topic of scandal and a shout of laughter most unpleasantly assailing the ears of Lord Cheston, a rather nervous gambler, caused him to deliver the dice at the other table with a jerk that upset his luck.
“Five-to-seven, and three-to-two against!” intoned the groom-porter dispassionately.
The laying and staking of bets shut out the noise of the other table, but as silence fell again and Lord Cheston picked up the box, Mr Drelincourt’s voice floated over to the fifty-guinea table with disastrous clarity.
“Oh, my lord, I protest; for my part I would lay you odds rather on my Lord Lethbridge’s success with my cousin’s stammering bride!” said Mr Drelincourt with a giggle.
The Viscount, already somewhat flushed with wine, was in the act of raising his glass to his lips when this unfortunate remark was wafted to his ears. His cerulean blue eyes, slightly clouded but remarkably intelligent still, flamed with the light of murder, and with a spluttered growl of “Hell and damnation!” he lunged up out of his chair before anyone could stop him.
Sir Roland Pommeroy made a grab at his arm. “Pel, I say, Pel! Steady!”
“Lord, he’s three parts drunk!” said Mr Boulby. “Here’s a pretty scandal! Pelham, for God’s sake think what you’re doing!”
But the Viscount, having shaken Pommeroy off, was already striding purposefully over to the other table, and seemed to have not the least doubt of what he was doing. Mr Drelincourt, looking round, startled to see who was bearing down upon him, let his jaw drop in ludicrous dismay, and received the contents of his lordship’s glass full in his face. “You damned little rat, take that!” roared the Viscount.
There was a moment’s shocked silence, while Mr Drelincourt sat with the wine dripping off the end of his nose, and staring at the incensed Viscount as one bemused.
Mr Fox, coming over from the other table, grasped Lord Winwood by the elbow, and addressed Mr Drelincourt with severity. “You’d best apologize, Crosby,” he said. “Pelham, do recollect! This won’t do, really it won’t!”
“Recollect?” said the Viscount fiercely. “You heard what he said, Charles! D’you think I’ll sit by and let a foul-mouthed—”
“My lord!” interrupted Mr Drelincourt, rising and dabbing at his face with a rather unsteady hand. “I—I apprehend the cause of your annoyance. I assure your lordship you have me wrong! If I said anything that—that seemed—”
Mr Fox whispered urgently: “Let it alone now, Pel! You can’t fight over your sister’s name without starting a scandal.”
“Be damned to you, Charles!” said the Viscount. “I’ll manage it my way. I don’t like the fellow’s hat!”
Mr Drelincourt fell back a pace; someone gave a snort of laughter, and Sir Roland said wisely: “That’s reasonable enough. You don’t like his hat. That’s devilish neat, “pon my soul it is! Now you come to mention it, ecod, I don’t like it either!”
“No, I don’t like it!” declared the Viscount, rolling a fiery eye at the offending structure. “Pink roses, egad, above that complexion! Damme, it offends me, so it does!”
Mr Drelincourt’s bosom swelled. “Sirs, I take you all to witness that his lordship is in his cups!”
“Hanging back, are you?” said the Viscount, thrusting Mr Fox aside. “Well, you won’t wear that hat again!” With which he plucked the straw confection from Mr Drelincourt’s head and casting it on the floor ground his heel in it.
Mr Drelincourt, who had borne with tolerable composure the insult of a glass of wine thrown in his face, gave a shriek of rage, and clapped his hands to his head. “My wig! My hat! My God, it passes all bounds! You’ll meet me for this, my lord! I say you shall meet me for this!”
“Be sure I will!” promised the Viscount, rocking on the balls of his feet, his hands in his pockets. “When you like, where you like, swords or pistols!”
Mr Drelincourt, pale and shaking with fury, besought his lordship to name his friends. The Viscount cocked an eyebrow at Sir Roland Pommeroy. “Pom? Cheston?”
The two gentlemen indicated expressed their willingness to serve him.
Mr Drelincourt informed them that his seconds would wait upon them in the morning, and with a somewhat jerky bow withdrew from the room. The Viscount, his rage at the insult to Horatia slightly assuaged by the satisfactory outcome of the disturbance, returned to his table and continued there in the highest fettle until eight in the morning.
Somewhere about noon, when he was still in bed and asleep, Sir Roland Pommeroy visited his lodging in Pall Mall and, disregarding the valet’s expostulations, pushed his way into my lord’s room and rudely awakened him. The Viscount sat up, yawning, rolled a blear-eye upon his friend, and demanded to know what the devil was amiss.
“Nothing’s amiss,” replied Sir Roland, seating himself on the edge of the bed. “We have it all fixed, snug as you please.”
The Viscount pushed his nightcap to the back of his head and strove to collect his scattered wits. “What’s fixed?” he said thickly.
“Lord man, your meeting!” said Sir Roland, shocked.
“Meeting?” The Viscount brightened. “Have I called someone out? Well, by all that’s famous!”
Sir Roland, casting a dispassionate and expert eye over his principal, got up and went over to the wash-basin and dipped one of his lordship’s towels in cold water. This he wrung out and silently handed to the Viscount, who took it gratefully and bound it round his aching brow. It seemed to assist him to clear his brain, for presently he said: “Quarrelled with someone, did I? Damme, my head’s like to split! Devilish stuff, that burgundy.”
“More likely the brandy,” said Sir Roland gloomily. “You drank a deal of it.”
“Did I so? You know, there was something about a hat—a damned thing with pink roses. It’s coming back to me.” He clasped his head in his hands, while Sir Roland sat and picked his teeth in meditative patience. “By God, I have it! I’ve called Crosby out!” suddenly exclaimed the Viscount.
“No, you haven’t,” corrected Sir Roland. “He called you. You wiped your feet on his hat, Pel.”
“Ay, so I did, but that wasn’t it,” said the Viscount, his brow darkening.
Sir Roland removed the gold toothpick from his mouth, and said succinctly: “Tell you what, Pel, it had best be the hat.”
The Viscount nodded. “It’s the devil’s own business,” he said ruefully. “Ought to have stopped me.”
“Stop you!” echoed Sir Roland. “You flung a glass of wine in the fellow’s face before anyone knew what you was about.”
The Viscount brooded, and presently sat up again with a jerk. “By God, I’m glad I did it! You heard what he said, Pom?”
“Drunk, belike,” offered Sir Roland.
“There’s not a word of truth in it,” said the Viscount with grim meaning. “Not a word, Pom, d’you take me?”
“Lord, Pel, no one ever thought there was! Ain’t one fight enough for you?”
The Viscount grinned rather sheepishly and leaned back against the bed-head. “What’s it to be? Swords or pistols?”
“Swords,” replied Sir Roland. “We don’t want to make it a killing matter. Fixed it all up for you out at Barn Elms, Monday at six.”
The Viscount nodded, but seemed a trifle abstracted. He discarded the wet towel and looked wisely across at his friend. “I was drunk, Pom, that’s the tale.”
Sir Roland, who had resumed the use of his toothpick, let it fall in his surprise, and gasped: “You’re never going to back out of it, Pel?”
“Back out of it?” said the Viscount. “Back out of a fight? Burn it, if I didn’t know you for a fool, Pom, I’d thrust that down your gullet, so I would!”
Sir Roland accepted this shamefacedly, and begged pardon.
“I was drunk,” said the Viscount, “and I took a dislike to Crosby’s hat—Damn it, what’s he want with pink roses in his hat? Answer me that!”
“Just what I said myself,” agreed Sir Roland. “Fellow can wear a hat at Almack’s if he likes. Do it myself sometimes. But pink roses—no.”
“Well, that’s all there is to it,” said the Viscount with finality. “You put it about I was in my cups. That’s the tale.”
Sir Roland agreed that ought certainly to be the tale and picked up his hat and cane. The Viscount prepared to resume his interrupted slumber, but upon Sir Roland’s opening the door, opened one eye and adjured him on no account to forget to order breakfast at Barn Elms.
Monday dawned very fair, a cool lifting mist giving promise of a fine day to come. Mr Drelincourt, accompanied in a coach by his seconds, Mr Francis Puckleton and Captain Forde, arrived at Barn Elms some time before six, this excessive punctuality being accounted for by the irregularity of the
Captain’s watch. “But it’s no matter,” said the Captain. “Drink a bumper of cognac and take a look at the ground, hey, Crosby?”
Mr Drelincourt assented with rather a wan smile.
It was his first fight, for though he delighted in the delivery of waspish speeches he had never until that fatal Friday felt the least desire to cross swords with anyone. When he had seen the Viscount stalking towards him at Almack’s he had been quite aghast, and would have been perfectly willing to eat the rash words that had caused all the bother had not the Viscount committed that shocking rape upon his hat and wig. Mr Drelincourt was so much in the habit of considering his appearance above anything else that this brutal action had roused him to a really heroic rage. At that moment he had quite genuinely wanted to spit the Viscount on the end of a small-sword, and if only they could have engaged there and then he had no doubt that he would have acquitted himself very well. Unfortunately etiquette did not permit of so irregular a proceeding, and he had been forced to kick his heels for two interminable days. When his rage had died down it must be confessed that he began to look forward with apprehension to Monday’s meeting. He spent a great deal of the weekend perusing Angelo’s Ecole d’Armes, a work that made his blood run quite cold. He had, of course, learned the art of fencing, but he had a shrewd notion that a buttoned foil presented a very different appearance from a naked duelling sword. Captain Forde congratulated him on having hit upon a worthy opponent in the Viscount, who, he said, though he was perhaps a trifle reckless, was no mean swordsman. He had already fought two duels, but one had been with pistols, with which weapon he was considered to be very dangerous. Mr Drelincourt could only be thankful that Sir Roland had chosen swords.
Captain Forde, who seemed to take a gruesome delight in the affair, recommended his principal to go early to bed on Sunday night and on no account to drink deep. Mr Drelincourt obeyed him implicitly, but passed an indifferent night. As he tossed and turned, wild ideas of inducing his seconds to settle for him crossed his brain. He wondered how the Viscount was spending the night and entertained a desperate hope that he might be drinking himself under the table. If only some accident or illness would befall him! Or perhaps ioo he himself could be smitten by a sudden indisposition? But in the cold light of dawn he was forced to abandon this scheme. He was not a very brave man, but he had his pride: one could not draw back from an engagement.
Mr Puckleton was the first of his seconds to arrive in the morning, and while Crosby dressed he sat astride a chair sucking the knob of his tall cane and regarding his friend with a melancholy and not unadmiring eye.
“Forde’s bringing the weapons,” he said. “How do you feel, Crosby?”
There was an odd sensation in the pit of Mr Drelincourt’s stomach, but he replied: “Oh, never better! Never better, I assure you.”
“For myself,” said Mr Puckleton, “I shall leave it all to Forde. To tell you the truth, Crosby, I’ve never acted for a man before. Wouldn’t do it for anyone but you. I can’t stand the sight of blood, you know. But I have my vinaigrette with me.”
Then Captain Forde arrived with a long flat case under his arm. Lord Cheston, he said, had engaged to bring a doctor with him, and Crosby had better make haste, for it was time they were starting.
The morning air struck a chill into Mr Drelincourt’s bones; he huddled himself into his greatcoat and sat in a corner of the coach listening to the macabre conversation of his two companions. Not that either the Captain or Mr Puckleton talked about the duel; in fact, they chatted on the most mild subjects such as the beauty of the day, the quietness of the streets, and the Duchess of Devonshire’s al fresco party. Mr Drelincourt found himself hating them for their apparent callousness, yet when the Captain did mention the duel, reminding him to meet so dashing a fighter as the Viscount with steadiness and caution, he turned a sickly hue and did not answer.
Arrived at Barn Elms they drew up at an inn adjacent to the meeting place, and there the Captain discovered that his watch was considerably in advance of the correct time. Casting a knowing glance at his pallid principal, he then made his suggestion they should drink a glass of cognac, for, said he in Mr Puckleton’s ear: “We’ll never get our man on the ground by the looks of it.”
The brandy did little to restore Mr Drelincourt’s failing spirits, but he drank it, and with an assumption of nonchalance accompanied his seconds out of the back of the inn and across a field to the ground, which was pleasantly situated in a sort of spinney. Captain Forde said that he could not have a better place for fighting. “Upon my word, I envy you, Crosby!” he said heartily.
After that they walked back to the inn, to find that a second coach had driven up, containing Lord Cheston and a neat little man in black who clasped a case of instruments, and bowed very deeply to everybody. At first he mistook Captain Forde for Mr Drelincourt, but this was soon put right, and he bowed again to Crosby and begged pardon.
“Let me assure you, sir, that if it should chance that you are to be my patient you need have no alarms, none at all. A clean sword wound is a very different affair from a bullet wound, oh, very different!”
Lord Cheston offered his snuff-box to Mr Puckleton. “Attended a score of these affairs, haven’t you, Parvey?”
“Dear me, yes, my lord!” replied the surgeon, rubbing his hands together. “Why, I was present when young Mr Ffolliot was fatally wounded in Hyde Park. Ah, before your time, that would be, my lord. A sad business—nothing to be done. Dead on the instant. Dreadful.”
“Dead on the instant?” echoed Mr Puckleton, turning pale. “Oh, I trust nothing of that sort—really I wish I had not consented to act!”
The Captain gave a scornful snort and turned his shoulder, addressing Cheston. “Where’s Sir Roland, my lord?” he asked.
“Oh, he’s coming with Winwood,” replied Cheston, shaking some specks of snuff out of his lace ruffle. “Daresay they’ll drive straight to the ground. Thought Pom had best go and make sure Winwood don’t over-sleep. The very devil to wake up is Pel, you know.”
A faint, last hope flashed into Mr Drelincourt’s soul that perhaps Sir Roland would fail to bring his principal to the meeting place in time.
“Well,” said the Captain, glancing at his watch, “may as well go on to the ground, eh, gentlemen?”
The little procession started out once more, the Captain striding ahead with Lord Cheston, Mr Drelincourt following with his friend Puckleton and the doctor bringing up the rear.
Dr Parvey hummed a little tune to himself as he trod over the grass; Cheston and the Captain were talking casually of the improvements at Ranelagh. Mr Drelincourt cleared his throat once or twice and at last said: “If—if the fellow offers me an apology I think I should let it rest at that, d-don’t you, Francis?”
“Oh, yes, pray do!” agreed Mr Puckleton with a shudder. “I know I shall feel devilish queasy if there is much blood.”
“He was drunk, you know,” Crosby said eagerly. “Perhaps I should not have heeded him. I daresay he will be sorry by now. I don’t—I don’t object to him being asked if he cares to apologize.”
Mr Puckleton shook his head. “He’d never do it,” he opined. “He’s fought two duels already, so I’m told.”
Mr Drelincourt gave a laugh that quivered uncertainly in the middle.”Well, I hope he mayn’t have sat up over the bottle last night.”
Mr Puckleton was inclined to think that even such a mad young buck as Winwood would not do that.
By this time they had reached the ground and Captain Forde had opened that sinister case. Reposing in a bed of velvet lay two shining swords, their blades gleaming wickedly in the pale sunlight.
“It still wants a few minutes to six,” observed the Captain. “I take it your man won’t be late?”
Mr Drelincourt stepped forward. “Late? I give you my word I don’t intend to wait upon his lordship’s convenience! If he does not come by six I shall assume he does not mean to meet me, and go back to town.”
Lord Cheston looked him over with a certain haughtiness. “Don’t put yourself about, sir: he’ll be here.”
From the edge of the clearing a view of the road could be obtained. Mr Drelincourt watched it in an agony of suspense, and as the moments dragged past began to feel almost hopeful.
But just as he was about to ask Puckleton the time (for he felt sure it must now be well over the hour), a gig came into sight, bowling at a fine rate down the road. It drew up at the gate which stood open on to the meadow and turned in.
“Ah, here’s your man!” said Captain Forde. “And six of the clock exactly!”
Any hopes that Mr Drelincourt still nursed were put to flight. The Viscount, with Sir Roland Pommeroy beside him, was driving the gig himself, and from the way in which he was handling a restive horse it was evident that he was not in the least fuddled by drink. He drew up on the edge of the clearing, and sprang down from the high perch.
“Not late, am I?” he said. “Servant, Puckleton, servant, Forde. Never saw such a perfect morning in my life.”
“Well, you don’t see many of ’em, Pel,” remarked Cheston, with a grin.
The Viscount laughed. His laughter sounded fiendish to Mr Drelincourt.
Sir Roland had picked the swords out of their velvet bed and was glancing down the blades.
“Nothing to choose between ’em,” said Cheston, strolling over to him.
The Captain tapped Mr Drelincourt on the shoulder. “Ready, sir? I’ll take your coat and wig.”
Mr Drelincourt was stripped of his coat and saw that the Viscount, already in his shirt-sleeves, had sat down on a tree-stump and was pulling off his top boots.
“Take a drop of cognac, Pel?” inquired Sir Roland, producing a flask. “Keep the cold out.”
The Viscount’s reply was clearly wafted to Mr Drelincourt’s ears. “Never touch spirit before a fight, my dear fellow. Puts your eye out.” He stood up in his stockinged feet and began to roll up his sleeves. Mr Drelincourt, handing his wig to Mr Puckleton’s tender care, wondered why he had never before realized what sinewy arms the Viscount had. He found that Lord Cheston was presenting two identical swords to him. He gulped, and took one of them in a damp grasp.
The Viscount received the other, made a pass as though to test its flexibility, and stood waiting, the point lightly resting on the ground.
Mr Drelincourt was led to his place, the seconds stepped back. He was alone, facing the Viscount, who had undergone some sort of transformation. The careless good humour had left his handsome face, his roving eye looked remarkably keen and steady, his mouth appallingly grim.
“Ready, gentlemen?” Captain Forde called. “On guard!”
Mr Drelincourt saw the Viscount’s sword flash to the salute, and setting his teeth went through the same motions.
The Viscount opened with a dangerous thrust in prime, which Mr Drelincourt parried, but failed to take advantage of. Now that the assault was begun his jumping nerves became steadier; he remembered Captain Forde’s advice, and tried to keep a good guard. As for luring his opponent on, he was kept too busy keeping a proper measure to think of it. An opportunity offering he delivered a thrust in tierce which ought to have ended the affair. But the Viscount parried it by yielding the foible, and countered so quickly that Mr Drelincourt’s heart leapt into his mouth as in the very nick of time he recovered his guard.
The sweat was rolling off his brow and his breath came in exhausted gasps. All at once he thought he saw an opening and lunged wildly. Something icily cold pierced his shoulder, and as he reeled the seconds’ swords struck his wavering blade upwards. It flew out of his hand, and he sank back into the arms of.Mr Puckleton, who cried out: “My God, is he killed? Crosby! Oh, there is blood! I positively cannot bear it!”
“Killed? Lord, no!” said Cheston scornfully. “Here, Parvey, neatly pinked through the shoulder, I take it you are satisfied, Forde?”
“I suppose so,” grunted the Captain. “Damme, if I ever saw a tamer fight!” He looked disgustedly down at the prostrate form of his principal, and inquired of Dr Parvey whether it was a dangerous wound.
The doctor glanced up from his work and beamingly replied: “Dangerous, sir? Why, not in the least! A little blood lost, no harm done. A beautifully clean wound!”
The Viscount, struggling into his coat, said: “Well, I’m for breakfast. Pom, did you bespeak breakfast?”
Sir Roland, who was conferring with Captain Forde, looked over his shoulder. “Now, Pel, would I forget a thing like that? I’m asking Forde here if he cares to join us.”
“Oh, by all means!” said the Viscount, shaking out his ruffles. “Well, if you’re ready, I am, Pom. I’m devilish hungry.”
With which he linked his arm in Sir Roland’s and strolled off to tell his groom to drive the gig round to the inn.
Mr Drelincourt, his shoulder bandaged and his arm put into a sling, was assisted to his feet by the cheerful doctor, and assured that he had merely received a scratch. His surprise at finding himself still alive held him silent for a few moments, but he presently realized that the dreadful affair was at an end, and that his wig lay on the ground beside his shoes.
“My toupet!” he said faintly. “How could you, Francis? Give it to me at once!”