(1) Captain Mathews had run Mr. Long through the body with a sword.(2) Captain Mathews had shot Mr. Long with a pistol.(3) Mr. Long had run Captain Mathews through the body with a sword.(4) Mr. Long had shot Captain Mathews with a pistol.(5) Mr. Long was dead.(6) Captain Mathews was dead.(7) Both Mr. Long and Captain Mathews were dead.(8) Neither of them had received a scratch.(9) There had been no fight, as Mr. Long had offered a handsome apology for his conduct, and had agreed to pay Mathews a thousand pounds by way of compensation.
(1) Captain Mathews had run Mr. Long through the body with a sword.
(2) Captain Mathews had shot Mr. Long with a pistol.
(3) Mr. Long had run Captain Mathews through the body with a sword.
(4) Mr. Long had shot Captain Mathews with a pistol.
(5) Mr. Long was dead.
(6) Captain Mathews was dead.
(7) Both Mr. Long and Captain Mathews were dead.
(8) Neither of them had received a scratch.
(9) There had been no fight, as Mr. Long had offered a handsome apology for his conduct, and had agreed to pay Mathews a thousand pounds by way of compensation.
These were only a few of the items of the Pump Room gossip, and every item found its adherents.
The lampooners took their choice. It was immaterial to them whether Mathews killed Long or Long killed Mathews; they treated the matter with the cynicism of Iago in regard to the killing of Cassio. They found that there was a good deal to be said in favour of every rumour, and they said it through the medium of some very wretched verses.
Mr. Long seemed to be the only man in Bath who remained unaffected in any way by the occurrence at Bath-Easton, about which, and its sequel, every one was talking. He refused to be drawn into the controversy as to whether he had attacked Mathews or been attacked by Mathews, and he declined to take sides in the question of the identity of the one who had been killed in the duel, though it might have been fancied that this was a question which would have a certain amount of interest for him. He refused to alter his mode of life in any degree. He appeared in public places no less frequently, but no more frequently, than before, and those people who had heard him affirm that there would be no duel, began, when the third day had passed, to think that there was some element in the quarrel with which they were unacquainted.
Dick Sheridan was greatly amazed, but extremely well pleased, when he heard from Mr. Long’s own lips that he had not received a communication on behalf of the man whom he had horsewhipped. It was when he was sitting at supper within his own house, with Dick sitting opposite to him, on the fourth day after the incident, that he so informed Dick.
“I did not speak without a full knowledge of my man, when I affirmed that there would be no duel,” said Mr. Long. “I was not so sure in regard to the challenge; but you see there is to be no challenge.”
It so happened, however, that before they had risen from the table, a gentleman arrived at the house on behalf of Captain Mathews, bearing a challenge, and requesting to be put in communication with Mr. Long’s friend.
The gentleman’s name was Major O’Teague. He was an Irishman, who lived for two months out of the year at Bath, and the remaining ten months no one knew where—perhaps in Ireland. No one knew in what regiment he served, and no one cared to know. He himself was not communicative on the matter, and he did not affect any particular uniform. He had, however, been known to talk of his father’s fighting in the Irish Brigade at Fontenoy, and that led some people to believe that he had won his rank in the same service.
When questioned on this point, he had replied that he always stood by the side of Freedom and the Fair. The consensus of opinion was that this sentiment did not materially assist one to identify the corps or the country in which he had won distinction. He was, however, known to be a good swordsman, and he always paid something on account to his landlady, so Bath ceased to take an interest in his military career. That he was carefully studied by young Mr. Sheridan there can be but little doubt, though it was Mrs. Cholmondeley who pretended to forget his name upon one occasion, and alluded to him as Major O’Trigger, an accident which young Mr. Sheridan never forgot.
He was excessively polite—“No man is so polite unless he means mischief,” was the thought which came to Dick when Major O’Teague was announced.
He addressed himself to Mr. Long, having declined, with a longing eye and a reluctant voice, a glass of sherry.
“Sir,” he said, “I come on a delicate mission”—he pronounced the adjective “dilicate,” for even the stress of Fontenoy and a course of Bath waters failed to reduce the heritage of the Irish Brigade—and gave a polite glance in the direction of Dick.
“Mr. Richard Brinsley Sheridan is my friend, sir,” said Mr. Long. “He is in my confidence, so that it is unnecessary for him to retire.”
“Very well, sir,” said the visitor. “I doubt not that Mr. Sheridan is a man of honour: his name, anyway, is illustrious” (pronounced “illusthrious”) “in the roll of fame of Irishmen. I mind that my father, the colonel, said that Owen Roe O’Neil Sheridan was a lieutenant in Clare’s regiment, and a very divil at that.”
“I have no doubt that Mr. Richard Brinsley Sheridan is duly proud of having at least one name in common with the lieutenant, sir,” said Mr. Long.
“And he would have every right, sir, let me tell you,” said Major O’Teague warmly. “My father knew that the boast of the Sheridans was that before the trouble came upon them in Ireland there never had been a wine-glass inside their castle.”
“A family of water-drinkers, sir?” suggested Mr. Long.
“Nothing of the sort, sir; they drank their liquor out of tumblers,” cried Major O’Teague. “Did y’ever hear tell”—the Major had elapsed into the French idiom—“did y’ever hear tell of the answer that Brian Oge O’Brian Sheridan made to the English officer that called at the castle when the colonel’s horse had been stolen, Mr. Sheridan?”
“Sir,” said Dick with dignity, “these are family affairs, and I should be reluctant to obtrude them on the attentionof Mr. Long at this time—though, of course, if you came to talk to him on this topic——”
“I ask your pardon, sir,” said Major O’Teague fiercely. “I come on business, not pleasure. Mr. Long, sir, I have been entrusted by my friend, Captain Mathews, with a communication which I have no doubt that, as a man of honour, you have been anticipating since that unfortunate little affair at Bath-Easton.”
With a low bow he handed Mr. Long a folded-up letter.
Mr. Long turned it over in his hands without opening it. A puzzled expression was on his face. “I expected no communication from Mr. Mathews, sir,” said he. “Pray, Major O’Teague, are you certain that the missive has not been wrongly directed to me?”
“What, sir,” cried Major O’Teague, “do you tell me that after what happened, after whaling another gentleman within an inch of his life, and in the middle of the best company in Bath, you don’t expect to hear from him?”
“Is it possible that Mr. Mathews considers himself insulted, sir?” asked Mr. Long.
The Irishman’s jaw fell. He was stupefied. His lips moved, but it was a long time before a word came.
“An insult—an ins—— Hivins above us, sir, where is it that y’have lived at all?” he managed to say at last. “An insult—an ins—— Oh, the humour of it! Flaying a man alive with a postillion’s whip; not even a coachman’s whip,—there’s some dignity in a coachman’s whip,—but a common postillion’s! sir, the degradation of the act passes language, so it does. ’Tis an insult that can only be washed out by blood—blood, sir—a river of blood! A river? A sea of blood, sir—an ocean of blood! Egad, sir, ’tis a doubtful question, that it is, if all great Neptune’s ocean—— Ye’ve seen Mrs. Yates as Lady Macbeth, I doubt not, Mr. Sheridan? A fine actress, sir, and an accomplished lady——”
“I have never had that privilege, sir,” said Dick. “You were making a remark about great Neptune’s ocean.”
“And I’ll make it again, by your leave, sir. I say that ’tis a nice question if the wounds inflicted upon a gentleman’s honour by the free use of a low postillion’s whip can be cauterised by all great Neptune’s ocean.”
“’Tis a nice question, I doubt not, sir,” said Dick.
“That’s the conclusion my friend the captain and me came to before we had more than talked the business half over, and so we determined that it must be nipped in the bud,” said Major O’Teague, with the fluency of a practised rhetorician.
Meantime Mr. Long had opened the letter. The seal was about the size of a crown piece, and the breaking of it was quite apocalyptic.
“’Tis true, Major O’Teague,” said he mournfully. “Your friend has been pleased to take offence at what was, after all, an unimportant incident.”
“Pray, sir, may I inquire if your notion is that a gentleman should not take offence at anything less than getting his head cut off?” said Major O’Teague with great suavity. “You think that a gentleman shouldn’t send a challenge unless the other gentleman has mortally wounded him?”
“I like to take a charitable view of every matter, sir; and I give you my word that I believed that Mr. Mathews had more discretion than to challenge me to—to—may I say?—to show him my hand,” said Mr. Long.
“To show him your hand, sir? I protest that I don’t understand you at all, Mr. Long,” said Major O’Teague. “This is not a challenge to a friendly game of cards, sir, let me assure you. When you show your hand to my friend, I trust it’s a couple of swords that’ll be in it, or a brace of pistols, which form a very gentlemanly diversion on the green of a morning.”
“Mr. Sheridan, I shall ask you to do me the honour of acting for me in this unfortunate affair,” said Mr. Long.
“Sir,” cried Dick, “if you will allow me to take this quarrel on myself I shall feel doubly honoured.”
“’Tis reluctant I am to thrust forward my opinion uncalled for; but if my own father—rest his sowl!—was to offer to cheat me out of a fight, I’d have his life, if he was a thousand times my father,” said Major O’Teague.
“This quarrel is mine, Mr. Sheridan,” said Mr. Long. “You and Major O’Teague will settle the preliminaries in proper fashion. Have you ever been concerned in an affair of this sort before, Major O’Teague, may I ask?”
Major O’Teague staggered back till he was supported by the wainscot. He stared at his questioner.
“Is it Major O’Teague that y’ask the question of?” he said in a whisper that was not quite free from hoarseness. “Is it me—me—ever engaged in an affair of honour?” He took out his handkerchief and wiped his brow. Then he shook his head mournfully and turned his eyes devotionally to the ceiling. “And this is fame!” he murmured. “Oh, my country! this is fame!”
“By the way, sir, what is your country?” asked Mr. Long.
“My father fought at Fontenoy, and my mother was called in her young days the Lily of the Loire, on account of her elegance and simplicity; and if that doesn’t make me an Irishman in the sight of Heaven, you may call me anything you please. But I’ve been mistaken for an Englishman before now,” he added proudly, “and I might have been one too if it hadn’t been for my parentage.”
“An Irish exile. The figure is a pathetic one, sir,” said Mr. Long. “I have met several in France.”
“France was overrun with them, sir. But ’tis not so bad now as it used to be,” said Major O’Teague. “A good many of them have returned to Ireland, and in ashort time we’ll hear that Ireland is overrun with her own exiles.”
“We shall be compelled in that case to withdraw our sympathy from them and bestow it upon their country,” said Mr. Long. “We can only sympathise with expatriated patriots who live in banishment. With exiles who refuse to die out of their own country we can have no sympathy.”
“My sentiments to a hair’s breadth,” cried Major O’Teague. “I declare to hivins there’s some Irish exiles that have never stirred out of Ireland! But they’re not the worst. Ireland has harboured many snakes in her bosom from time to time, but the bitterest cup of them all has been the one that burst into flower on a foreign shore, and, having feathered its nest, crawled back to the old country to heap coals of fire upon the head of her betrayers.”
“The metamorphoses of the Irish snake—which I believed did not exist—appear to have been numerous and confusing; but surely you will take a glass of wine now, major?” said Mr. Long. “Pray pass Major O’Teague the decanter, Mr. Sheridan.”
Dick obeyed, and Major O’Teague’s face, which one might have expected to brighten, became unusually and, as it seemed, unnecessarily solemn. He protested that he had no need for any refreshment—that so far from regarding as irksome the duty which he had just discharged, he considered it one of the greatest pleasures in life to bring a challenge to a gentleman of Mr. Long’s position. He only accepted the hospitality of Mr. Long lest he should be accused of being a curmudgeon if he refused.
“Gentlemen,” he cried, raising his glass, “I drink to your very good health and to our better acquaintance. I have been more or less intimately concerned in the death of fourteen gentlemen, but there’s not one of them that won’t say to-day, if y’ask him, that he was killed in the most gentlemanly way, and in a style suitable to his position. If youhave anything to complain of on this score, Mr. Long, my name is not O’Teague. Here’s long life to you, sir.”
“Without prejudice to the longevity of your friend Captain Mathews, I suppose?” said Mr. Long.
“We’ll drink to him later on, sir. The night’s young yet,” said Major O’Teague, with a wink that had a good deal of slyness about it.
Major O’Teague did not stay late. He apologised for hurrying away from such excellent company; but the fact was that he had, in a thoughtless hour, accepted an invitation to supper from a lady who was as beautiful as she was virtuous—perhaps even more so. He hoped that Mr. Long would pardon the precipitancy of his flight, and not attribute it to any churlishness on his part.
Mr. Long did his best to reassure him on this point,—he had already stayed for an hour, and had drunk a bottle and a half of claret and half a tumbler of brandy “to steady the wine,” he declared; and indeed it seemed that the claret was a little shaky.
When they were alone Dick said:
“I was afraid, sir, that letter would come to you.”
He shook his head with the air of a man who has had a varied experience of men and their ways.
“I frankly confess that I was surprised to receive it,” said Mr. Long. “But I had made my calculations without allowing for such a possibility as this Major O’Teague. Mathews had some remnant of discretion, and that is why three days have passed before I receive his challenge.”
“You think that Mathews would not have sent it of his own accord?” said Dick.
“I am convinced of it,” replied Mr. Long. “He knows something of what I know about him, and he has given methe best evidence in the world of his desire to get rid of me once and for all. But he would never have sent me this challenge had it not been that that fire-eating Irish adventurer got hold of him and talked him into a fighting mood. What chance would a weak fool such as Mathews have against so belligerent a personality as O’Teague? Heavens, sir, give the man an hour with the most timorous of human beings, and I will guarantee that he will transform him into a veritable swashbuckler. Mathews is a fool, and he is probably aware of it by now—assuming that an hour and a half has elapsed since O’Teague left him.”
“If he had not challenged you, he need never have shown his face in Bath again,” said Dick.
“Oh, my dear Dick, you have not seen so much of Bath as I have,” said Mr. Long. “Bath will stand a great deal. Has it not stood Mathews for several years?”
Dick made no reply; he was walking to and fro in the room in considerable agitation. At last he stood before Mr. Long.
“Dear sir,” he cried, “why will you not consent to my taking this quarrel on myself? Why should you place your life in jeopardy for the gratification of Mathews and his associates? Think, sir, that your life is valuable; while mine—well, I can afford to risk it.”
“My dear boy, you have risked your life once for me,” said Mr. Long, laying a hand on Dick’s shoulder. “I cannot permit you to do so a second time. But believe me, I shall run no risk in this matter. I give you my word that I shall never stand up before that fellow. Why, when his friend the major was juggling, but without the skill of a juggler, with his metaphors just now, I was thinking out three separate and distinct plans for making a duel impossible, however well-intentioned Major O’Teague may be.”
“Tell me but one of them, Mr. Long,” said Dick.
“Nay, my friend, I debated the question of telling you when I had worked out my plans of campaign, and I came to the conclusion that you must know nothing of—of—of what I know,” said Mr. Long. “You hope to write a play one of these days? Well, sir, there is no discipline equal to that of one’s daily life for a man who aspires to write a comedy dealing with the follies of the time. The comedy of the duel has never been rightly dealt with. Behold your chance, sir.”
Dick resumed the shaking of his head.
“Ah, sir, what I dread is the play which one means to be a comedy, but which becomes in its development a tragedy.”
“True, that is always to be dreaded,” said Mr. Long. “And I allow that Fate is not a consistent designer of plays. She mixes up comedy and tragedy in such a tangle that her own shears alone can restore the symmetry of the piece. When Fate puts on the mask of comedy the result is very terrible. But we shall do our best to get her to play a leading part on our side, in our company, and I promise you some diversion. Now you must act in this little play as if you were no novice on the stage, but as if, like Major O’Teague, you had played the part fourteen times. At the outstart you must get rid of your nervousness. I tell you again, the play is a comedy.”
“I would not be nervous if I were playing the chief part, sir.”
“What, you are still willing to play the leading character? That is quite unlike a play-actor, Mr. Sheridan. Is’t not very well known that an actor would submit to anything rather than play a leading character? Has your father never told you how anxious they all are to be cast for the insignificant parts?”
Dick laughed.
“Oh, that, sir, is one of the best-known traits of the profession of acting,” he said. “But I should dearly like to have a shot at Captain Mathews.”
“He is a soldier, but I fear that he will not meet his death by so honourable an agent,” said Mr. Long. “No, if he dies by a shot it will be fired at him by a platoon of men with muskets. Now, you will arrange with Major O’Teague as to the time and place of the meeting. I have no choice in regard to the weapons; but I wish to suggest as a suitable ground the green paddock facing the iron gate where you came to my assistance when I was attacked by the footpads.”
“I do not see that the man can make any objection to so suitable a place,” said Dick.
“We shall see,” said Mr. Long. “At any rate, it is my whim to meet him there. You see, I was once very lucky in that neighbourhood, and I have my superstitions.”
Dick went home with a heavy heart. He could not understand why Mr. Long should still persist in the belief that no duel would be fought. He seemed to have acquired the idea that Mathews was a coward because he had taken his horsewhipping so quietly; but Dick, having seen how the fellow had been overpowered at the outset by the superior strength of his opponent, knew perfectly well that he had had no choice in the matter. He had displayed weakness, but not cowardice; and Dick had felt certain that he was just the man to seek an opportunity of revenging himself with the weapons of the duellist. He had believed all along that Mathews would regard the realisation of his scheme as a matter of life or death. If it became known that he had evaded calling out the man who had so publicly insulted him, he would, of course, be compelled to leave Bath. If, however, he succeeded in killing Mr. Long—and Dick felt convinced that he would do his best to killhim—he would be able to swagger about as the hero of the hour. That was therôlewhich exactly suited him.
But would he have the chance of killing Mr. Long?
Before he slept, Dick had made up his mind that if Mathews killed Mr. Long, he himself would either prevent his playing therôleof the hero, or give him a double chance of playing it. The moment this duel with Mr. Long was over he would send a challenge to Mathews. He felt that he would have every right to do so. The horsewhipping which Mr. Long had administered to the man was a sufficient punishment for his insult; but Dick did not forget that the placing of the ribald verses in the urn was a gross insult to every lady present on the lawn at Bath-Easton, and he had long ago made up his mind that he would accept the responsibility of avenging this special affront. All the sophistry of his chivalrous nature backed up this resolution of his, until he had no difficulty in feeling that he was the exponent of a sacred duty. Was it to be placed in the power of any rascal, he asked an imaginary objector, to insult a number of ladies in the shocking way that Mathews had done, with impunity? Was that entire company to have no redress for the gross conduct of the fellow?
Surely it was the privilege of every man with a spark of chivalry in his nature—ordinary chivalry, mind, the ordinary spirit of manhood—to do all that lay within his power to prevent a recurrence of such an outrage upon civilised society as had been perpetrated. If no other man thought fit to make a move toward so desirable an end, he, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, thanked God that he saw his way clearly in the matter; and the moment he had ceased to act for Mr. Long, he would take action on his own behalf as the representative of the ladies on whose fastidious ears the ribald lines had fallen.He fell asleep quite easily, having made up his mind on this point.
He had an interview the next day with Major O’Teague, and found him ready to agree to any suggestion made in regard to the meeting. The only detail to which he took a momentary exception was in respect of the ground.
“Hivins, Mr. Sheridan, aren’t there many nice and tidy places more adjacent than that paddock, where our friends can have an enjoyable hour?” he said. “Faith, sir, I have always thought Bath singularly favoured by Providence in this respect. A bountiful Hivin seems to have designed it for the settlement of these little affairs. ’Tis singularly complete in this way, as you may have remarked. Egad! you could kill your man at the corner of any street. Doesn’t it seem to be spurning the gifts which Providence has laid at our very feet to go two miles out into the country?”
But Mr. Sheridan had something of the sentimental Irishman in his nature also, and so he was able to acknowledge frankly that it was on the border-line of atheism for any one to assert that it was necessary to go two miles out of Bath in order to conduct friendly hostilities; still, he thought that the whim of an old gentleman should be respected.
“Mr. Long has lived in the country all his life, you see, Major O’Teague, and that is no doubt why he makes it a point of sentiment always to fight in the midst of a sylvan landscape, free from the contaminating hand of man, you understand?” said Dick.
“’Tis a beautiful thought, sir,” said Major O’Teague, raising his eyes toward the ceiling. “And ’tis one that I can appreciate to the full, Mr. Sheridan. Thank Hivin, a life of pretty rough campaigning among pretty rough characters hasn’t blunted my finer sensibilities. I feel that we are bound to respect the whim of your friendjust as if we were his executors. ’Twould be just the same if he had expressed a desire to be buried under a special tree—maybe one that he had climbed for chestnuts when a boy, or courted the girl of his choice under when a sthripling. He didn’t say that he had a whim about being laid to rest under a special tree, sir?”
“We haven’t discussed that point yet, sir,” said Dick. “The fact is, I am rather a novice in this business, as you may have perceived, major.”
“Don’t apologise, sir; we must all make a beginning. ’Tis not your fault, I’m sure, Mr. Sheridan, that y’haven’t killed your man long ago.”
“You do me honour, sir,” said Dick.
“Not I, sir. Can’t I see with half an eye that y’have the spirit of an annihilator beating within your bosom? ’Tis only your misfortune that y’haven’t been given your chance yet. But I hope that y’ll mind that you must make up for lost time.”
“It will be my study, sir. I intend to begin without delay by calling out your friend Captain Mathews when this little affair is over.”
“Good luck to you, my boy!” cried Major O’Teague, enthusiastically flinging out his hand to Dick. “Good luck to you, sir! If you’ll allow me to act for you, ’twill be the proudest day of my life.”
“We shall talk the matter over when the first affair is settled. One thing at a time has always been my motto,” said Dick.
“I ask your pardon, Mr. Sheridan; I was a bit premature,” said Major O’Teague. “I won’t inquire what your reasons are for fighting Mathews; I never preshume to pry into the motives of gentlemen for whom I act. I hold that ’twould be an insult to their intelligence to do so. Besides, if one were to inquire into the rights and wrongs of every quarrel before it takes place, all manhood would die out ofEngland inside a year. No, sir; after the fight is the time to inquire, just as after dinner is the time for the speeches.”
But when Major O’Teague called upon Dick the same evening, as courtesy demanded, a wonderful smile came over his face while he said:
“What is there about that paddock opposite the iron gate by the Gloucester Road that makes your friend insist on it as the place of meeting?”
“I give you my word that I have no notion,” replied Dick. “Why should Captain Mathews object to it?”
“That’s more than I can say, sir,” said O’Teague. “But, by the Lord Harry, I had a long job getting him to agree to that point. You should have seen his face when I told him that we were to meet at that same paddock. He turned as white as a sheet, and said that Mr. Long meant to insult him by making such a suggestion. ‘’Tis not there that I’ll fight,’ said he, quite livid. You’ll excuse me introducing the special oaths that he made use of, Mr. Sheridan?”
“I am quite sure that their omission is more excusable than their utterance would be,” said Dick. “But he consented to the ground at last?”
“Ay, at last. But between the first hint of the matter and this ‘at last’ a good deal of conversation occurred. ’Twas pretty near my gentleman came to having a third affair pressed on him. For some reason or other he wanted to fight nearer town. Well, to be sure, it would be more homelike. I never did believe in the suburbs myself, and, besides, ’twill be very inconvenient for the spectators. Still——”
“My dear major,” cried Dick, “I trust that there will be no spectators beyond those gentlemen.”
“What, sir, would you propose to exclude the public from this entertainment? I hope that is not your idea ofwhat is due to the intelligent curiosity of the people of Bath? Asking your pardon, Mr. Sheridan, I must say that you have no notion at all of fair play.”
“You have had so much experience of these matters, Major O’Teague, I have every confidence that under your guidance we can manage this little business by ourselves, and without the need for the intrusion of all the busybodies in Bath,” said Dick.
“That may be true enough, Mr. Sheridan,” said Major O’Teague, “but let me remind you that the gentleman for whom I am acting got his horsewhipping in public—— Why the mischief wasn’t I there to see it? I would have given a guinea for a place in the front row!”
Dick clearly perceived that the man was anxious to be the centre of a crowd of onlookers; he was treating the duel from the standpoint of a showman desirous of making plain his own ability as a stage-manager of experience, and nothing would have pleased him better than to have engaged Drury Lane for the spectacle.
For a moment or two Dick was annoyed; he was sorely tempted to say something that would have been hurtful to Major O’Teague’s feelings. He restrained himself, however, and then he suddenly remembered—Major O’Teague had given him no reason to forget it—that he was talking to an Irishman. That was why he said in a confidential tone:
“I acknowledge the force of your argument, sir; but the fact is”—his voice became a whisper—“there is a lady in the case. You will agree with me in thinking that her feelings must be respected at any cost. Major O’Teague, if the lady—I refrain from mentioning her name in this connection—who has given Mr. Long her promise, were to hear of his danger, the consequences might be very serious to her. We are both Irishmen, sir.”
“Sir,” said Major O’Teague, “your thoughtfulness does you honour. No one ever yet made an appeal to me on behalf of a beauteous creature without success. The least wish of a lady is sacred in the eyes of Major O’Teague. If the lady wishes, we’ll set our men to fight at midnight in a coal-cellar.”
Somehow, in spite of Major O’Teague’s promise of secrecy, the rumour of the impending duel went round Bath, and Dick had to use all his adroitness in replying to those of his friends who questioned him on the subject in the course of the evening. But of course people were not nearly so certain about this encounter as they had been about the previous one—the one which did not take place. Young Mr. Sheridan’s imagination was quite equal to the strain put upon it by his interrogators, and he was able to give each of them a different answer. He assured some of them that he had excellent authority for believing that there was to be a meeting between Mr. Long and Captain Mathews, and that, in order to assure complete secrecy, it was to take place in the Pump Room before the arrival of the visitors some morning—he hoped to be able to find out the exact morning. Others he informed that it had been agreed by the friends of Mr. Long and Captain Mathews that they were to fight with pistols across the Avon at the next full moon; while to such persons as wanted circumstantial news on the subject, he gave the information in an undertone in a corner, that the fight was to come off on the following Thursday, on the lawn at Bath-Easton, Captain Mathews having declared that he would not be satisfied unless the same people who had witnessed the insult that had been put upon him werepresent to see him wipe it out. Dick even went the length of quoting the first two lines of a poem which he himself was composing for Lady Miller’s urn, feeling convinced that the prize would be awarded to him on account of its appropriateness. He meant to leave a blank in the final line, he said, to be filled up at the last moment with the name of the survivor.
The result of this unscrupulous exercise of his imagination was to alienate from him several of his friends and to mystify the others; so that, when he drove out with Mr. Long the next morning to the paddock by the Gloucester Road, it was plain that the secret as to the place of meeting had been well kept. Whatever might be said about Major O’Teague, he had respected the plea for secrecy advanced by Dick, though Dick knew that it must have gone to his heart to be deprived of the crowd of spectators on whom he had reckoned.
Dick saw that the ground lent itself to secrecy. At one part of the paddock there was a small plantation, and this screened off the greater part of it from the road. Here the ground was flat, but only for about half an acre; beyond this space there was a gradual rise into a wooded knoll, which could also be reached by a narrow lane leading off the road. Opposite the entrance to the paddock was the iron gate, behind which Mr. Long had retreated on the night when he was attacked; and now that Dick saw the place by daylight, he noticed that the gate gave access to the weedy carriage drive of an unoccupied house.
“A capital covert for footpads,” said Dick, when he stood by the side of Mr. Long beyond the plantation in the paddock. “I daresay it was just here that the fellows lay in wait for the approach of a victim.”
“That was the conclusion to which I came,” said Mr. Long. “And now here are we waiting for them.”
“For them?” said Dick.
“Well, for Mathews and his friend,” said Mr. Long with a quiet laugh.
“Worse than any footpads,” growled Dick, examining the ground just beyond the belt of trees.
“I promise you that they shall have neither my money nor my life, friend Dick,” said Mr. Long, looking round as if in expectation of seeing some one.
“We are before the appointed time,” said Dick, framing an answer to his inquiring look.
“We shall have the longer space to admire the prospect from yon knoll,” said his friend. “I am minded to have a stroll round the paddock. I promise you that I shall not disgrace you by running away.”
He waved his hand to Dick, who accepted the gesture as an indication that he desired to be alone. He busied himself about the ground while Mr. Long strolled toward the hedge that ran alongside the narrow lane skirting the paddock.
Dick fancied that he understood his desire to be alone for the brief space left to him before the probable arrival of Mathews and O’Teague. Could Mr. Long doubt for a moment that Mathews would do his best to kill him? Surely not.
So, then, the next quarter of an hour would decide the question whether he was to live or die. Dick remembered what Mr. Long had told him respecting his early life—his early love—his enduring love. What had his words been at that time?
“Those who die young have been granted the gift of perpetual youth.”
He watched Mr. Long walking slowly and with bent head up the sloping ground by the bramble hedge. He could believe that he was communing with the one of whom he had never ceased to think as his companion—the one whowalked unseen by his side—whose gracious presence had never ceased to influence him throughout his life. And then, all at once the younger man became conscious of that invisible presence. Never before had he been aware of such an impression. It was not shadowy. It was not vague. It was not a suggestion of the imagination. It was an impression as real as that of the early morning air which exhilarated him—as vivid as that of the song of the skylark which had left its nest at the upper part of the green meadow, and was singing while it floated into the azure overhead. He felt as if he were standing beneath outspread wings, and the consciousness was infinitely gracious to him. All through the night and so far into the morning he had been in great trouble of thought. The shocking possibilities of this duel had suggested themselves to him every moment, and it was with a feeling of profound depression that he had taken the case of pistols from the carriage and entered the paddock.
But now, with the suddenness of entering a wide space of free air, out of a narrow room of suffocating vapours—with the suddenness of stepping into the sunlight out of a cell, his depression vanished. He felt safe beneath the shadow of those gracious, outstretched wings. Every suggestion that had come to him during the night, every thought of the likelihood of disaster, disappeared.
The dead are mightier than the living.
That was the thought which came to him now. He knew that the sense of perfect security of which he was now aware, could not have been imparted to him by any earthly presence; and looking across the green meadow to where Mr. Long was standing motionless, Dick knew that he also was living in this consciousness. And the cool scent of the meadow grass filled the morning air, and high overhead the wings of song spread forth by the ecstasy of the skylark winnowed the air. The feeling of exhilarationof which Dick Sheridan was conscious, was such as he had never known before.
Looking up the paddock, Dick fancied that he saw a figure moving stealthily among the fringe of trees; but he was not quite certain that some one was there. A few sheep were in the meadow at the other side of the hedge, and he thought it was quite possible that one of the flock had strayed through a gap and had wandered among the trees. At any rate he failed to see again any moving object in the same direction, and he did not think it worth his while going across the ground to make further investigations. He reflected that, after all, assuming that some one was among the trees, it was out of his power to insist on the withdrawal of such a person. He felt that, if it were to turn out that the owner of the ground was there, the combatants might find themselves ordered off the ground, for assuredly they were trespassers. And then his reflections were broken by the noise of carriage wheels on the road—sounds which ceased quite suddenly just when they were being heard most distinctly. After a pause came the sound of voices and a laugh or two. In a few moments Major O’Teague, with Mathews by his side, and followed by two gentlemen—one of them was recognised by him as Mr. Ditcher, the surgeon—appeared beyond the plantation.
Dick advanced to meet the party, but Mr. Long made no move. He was still on the slope of the meadow, apparently giving a good deal of attention to the distant view of the city of Bath.
“Sir,” said Major O’Teague, “we’re a trifle late, and an apology is jew to you. I promise you that ’twill not occur again.”
Dick had been extremely punctilious in the matter of taking off his hat to the party, and he declined to replaceit until every one was covered. He assured Major O’Teague that no apology was necessary; he did not believe that it was yet five minutes past the appointed hour. Then Major O’Teague presented the only stranger of the party—a gentleman named MacMahon—“a brother Irishman, Mr. Sheridan,” he said, in discharging this act of courtesy; “a lineal descendant of the great FitzUrse who killed St. Thomas à Becket some years back; you may have heard of the occurrence. ’Tis not every day that one has a chance of killing a saint. Faith, I’m inclined to think that the practice has become obsolete owing to the want of material. Any way, Bath is not the place for any man to come to who seeks to emulate such a feat.”
Mr. MacMahon said he was modest; he sought to kill neither saint nor sinner. He hoped that Mr. Sheridan would not consider him an obtruder upon the scene; if Mr. Sheridan took such a view of the case, he would, he assured him, retire without a word of complaint.
Dick acknowledged his civility, and said that no friend of Major O’Teague’s would be out of place where an affair of honour was being settled.
While these courtesies were being exchanged, Mathews stood silently by, his teeth set, and his eyes fixed upon the distant figure of Mr. Long. He turned suddenly while Dick and Mr. MacMahon were bowing to each other, hat in hand.
“Is this afête champêtreor the rehearsal of a comedy?” he said. “If my time is to be wasted—— Where is your man, Mr. Sheridan?—produce your man, sir, if he be not afraid to show his face.”
“I trust that no suggestion will be made to that effect, sir,” said Dick.
“No one will make it while I am on the ground, Mr. Sheridan,” said Major O’Teague. “If anybody here sees anything inappropriate in Mr. Long spending a fewminutes in meditation, that person differs from me. Come, Mr. Sheridan, ’tis only for you and me to make any remarks. Egad, sir! I compliment your friend on his choice of the ground. It seems made for a jewel, so it does. That belt of trees shuts off the road entirely, and if we place our men on the flat, that hill behind us will give neither of them an unjew advantage. Sir, for one who is unfortunate enough to have had no experience of these affairs, you have shown an aptitude for the business that falls little short of jaynius.”
He glanced at the ground and its surroundings with the easy confidence of a general, and then marching to the right and left, cocked an eye in the direction of the sun.
“There’s no choice of places, that I can see; what do you say, Mr. Sheridan?” he asked.
“So far as I can judge there is no question of choice,” said Dick. “That is, of course, with pistols; it would be another matter with swords.”
“I agree with you, sir. Then, with your leave, we will measure the ground twenty paces from the line of trees.”
A considerable space of time was occupied in these formalities, and then came the question of the weapons. This was settled without discussion—Major O’Teague proving as courteous as he had promised to be; in fact, he thought it necessary to excuse his constant agreement with Dick.
“If there was anything to disagree about, you may be sure that I’d do it in the interest of Mr. Mathews, sir,” he said; “but I give you my word that there’s nothing to allow any side the smallest advantage. And now, sir, though it seems a pity to disturb the meditations of your friend, I am afraid that the time has come for you to take that step. I hope to Hivins that he won’t think it in bad taste. But you’re spared the trouble: he is coming to us.”
Mr. Long was walking quickly down the meadow, and when still a few paces away, he raised his hat to Major O’Teague, but ignored Mathews, who was standing some yards off.
“Major O’Teague,” he said, “I have to inform you that I have been giving the question of the projected duel my earnest thought, and the conclusion that I have come to is that I am not called on to fight Mr. Mathews.”
The words, spoken deliberately, but without any particular emphasis, startled Dick quite as much as they did Major O’Teague.
“You’re a coward, sir, and I will force you to fight me!” shouted Mathews.
Dick took a couple of steps to the side of Mr. Long, and at the same instant O’Teague took three to the side of Mathews.
“Hold your tongue, sir; leave me to manage this affair,” said Major O’Teague to his principal.
He took a step nearer Mr. Long.
“I’m afraid, sir,” he said in a frigid tone and with a distinctly English accent, which sounded very much more formal than the soft Irish slur which came so easily to him—“I’m afraid that there’s some misunderstanding between us; but a little explanation will, I daresay, tend to smooth away matters, and lead to such an amicable settlement that the fight will take place as originally intended. Pray, sir, state your reasons for saying that you’re not called on to consummate the jewel. Come, sir, your reasons.”
“My reasons? This is one of them,” said Mr. Long, pointing toward the bramble hedge beside the lane.
So intent had every one been over the technicalities of the duel, none had noticed a little figure standing there waiting for a signal—the figure of a little boy. WhenMr. Long raised his arm and pointed toward him, he began to run to the group, and now all eyes were turned upon him. He was a pretty child of perhaps eight or nine years of age, and while he ran he kept calling out:
“Daddy, daddy, I’se come, I’se come!”
No one in the group moved, and the little boy ran toward Mathews with outstretched arms. He had almost reached him before Mathews had recovered from the astonishment that had left his face pale. He stepped back, saying:
“Take the brat away! What demon brought him hither? Take him away, I say, before I do him a hurt.”
“’Tis not a demon that brings the like of that to men,” said O’Teague. Then, putting out his hands to the little boy, he cried, “Come hither, my little man, and tell us what is your name.”
The child stopped and gazed with wondering eyes at Major O’Teague, who was kneeling on one knee, with inviting hands stretched forth.
“Mammy said for I to run to daddy,” lisped the little fellow, and he looked round, putting a tiny thumb in his mouth.
“Take the brat away, or I shall do it a hurt,” shouted Mathews.
The child shrank back, and a frightened look came to his face.
“I’se good to-day, pappy,” he said. “I’se very good. I’se did what mammy told. She said, ‘Go to pappy,’ and I’se goed.”
Mathews, his hands clenched, took a step in the direction of Mr. Long, and Dick took a step in the direction of Mathews.
“Coward!” said the last named. “Coward! this is how you would shirk the fight that you owe me. You have brought them here.”
“Yes, I brought them here—all your family,” saidMr. Long. “And—yes, I own to being a coward; I own that I shrink from standing up with a deadly weapon in my hand before the husband of an estimable lady and the father of an innocent child. Captain Mathews, you are aware of the fact that I am acquainted with some compromising incidents in your past life. I do not wish you ill, sir. I implore of you to be advised in time. Return to your home, and make an honest attempt to redeem the past.”
“I will—I will—when I have seen you lying dead at my feet,” said Mathews. Then, turning to the others of the party, he cried: “Gentlemen, are we here to be made fools of? Let the affair proceed, or let Mr. Long and his friend make up their minds to be branded in public as cowards and poltroons.”
“Major O’Teague,” said Dick, “you cannot possibly have known that Captain Mathews, while professing honourable intentions in regard to a lady in Bath, was all the time a married man?”
“I acknowledge that that is the truth, Mr. Sheridan,” said Major O’Teague; “but you’ll pardon me if I say that I can’t for the life of me see what that disclosure has to do with the matter before us.”
“What, sir, you don’t think that a gentleman should be exempted from fighting with so unscrupulous an adventurer as, on your own admission, Captain Mathews has proved to be?” said Dick.
“Upon my soul, I don’t, Mr. Sheridan,” said O’Teague. “On the contrary, sir, it appears to me that a man who behaved so dishonourably as my friend Captain Mathews has done, makes a most suitable antagonist for a gentleman of honour like Mr. Long or yourself, sir.”
Mr. MacMahon, the stranger who had come to witness the fight, had taken the little boy by the hand, and was leading him up the meadow away from the men; and everynow and again the child looked over his shoulder with big, puzzled eyes. He was asking a perpetual question.
“Sir,” said Dick, with great promptitude when O’Teague had spoken—“Sir, I give you my word that I have no objection to fight Captain Mathews myself.”
“No,” cried Mr. Long. “No laws of honour demand that a gentleman shall stand up before a felon.”
“True, sir,” said Major O’Teague; “but you see, nothing that Captain Mathews has yet done can be construed as an act of felony.”
“Indeed, sir, Captain Mathews and I know better than that,” said Mr. Long.
“’Tis a lie—I swear that ’tis a foul lie!” shouted Mathews. “I admit that years ago—— But there were no proofs that the girl did not die by her own hands. She did it to be revenged upon me. Have you proofs? If you have, pray produce them.”
“I have proof enough to send you to the hangman,” said Mr. Long.
“Sir,” said Major O’Teague, “I did not come hither to listen to such recrimination. You must be aware, Mr. Long, that you have seriously compromised your position as a man of honour by making a vague charge against your opponent a pretext for backing out of a fight with him. If a man was a fool years ago—well, which of us hasn’t been a fool at some time of our life?”
“Sir,” said Mr. Long, “I do not need to be instructed on points of honour by you or any one else. I did not refer to your friend’s felony of four years ago, but to a much more recent act of his.”
“Let us have your proofs, sir, or, by Hivins, my felonious friend will have my assistance in branding you as a coward!” cried Major O’Teague.
Mr. Long was holding between his finger and thumb a small piece of lace before the man had done speaking.
“This is my proof,” he said.
Major O’Teague stared at him and then at Dick Sheridan. He saw that Dick was as much puzzled as himself.
“In the name of all that’s sensible——” he began.
“The fellow is a fool,” cried Mathews. “Ay, a fool as well as a coward.”
“In the name of all that’s sensible, Mr. Long, tell us what it is you mean at all,” said O’Teague. “What in the name of all the Hivins do you mean by showing us that rag?”
“This piece of lace is a souvenir that your friend left with me of our last encounter. Look at the torn ruffle of his right sleeve, sir. I think you will find that the rent needs for its repair this piece of lace which I hold in my hand.”
“Sir, I heard of no encounter,” said Major O’Teague.
“Then you would do well to get your friend to acquaint you with some of its details,” said Mr. Long.
Major O’Teague, mystified to a point of distraction, turned to Mathews; but he failed to catch his eye, the fact being that Mathews was gazing at Mr. Long as a man gazes at another who has just amazed him by a sudden revelation.
“Am I asleep or awake—that’s what I want to know?” cried Major O’Teague. “And I want to know it badly too, for what’s the drift of all these hints and all this aimless talk baffles me. Look you here, Mr. Long, you tell me you crossed swords with Captain Mathews quite lately; well, sir, if that is the truth, will you tell me why you should object to fight with him now?”
“Sir,” said Mr. Long, “Mr. Mathews was in the disguise of a footpad on that road between those trees and the iron gate opposite, and I fought for my life against him and his two confederates.”
Major O’Teague did not allow any one to see how startledhe was. He stroked his chin and pursed out his lips. There was a long pause before he said:
“And that is the evidence you bring forward of a very remarkable affair, sir—that scrap of rag?”
“Psha! sir, I have as much evidence of that remarkable affair as would suffice to hang the dean and chapter of a cathedral!” said Mr. Long.
“Pray give us an example of it, sir,” said the major. “Juries in this country don’t hang even dogs, to say nothing of deans, on the evidence of a scrap of rag.”
“That’s it,” said Mathews; his voice was a trifle husky—he had not had much practice in speaking for some minutes. “That’s it!—Major O’Teague, you are my friend: I ask no better friend. Let the fellow produce his evidence.”
“I will,” said Mr. Long.
He took a few steps toward the trees around the knoll where Dick had fancied he saw some figures moving. He raised a finger, and at this signal two men clad in homespun hastened down the meadow.
Mathews’ jaw fell.
“One of these men was Mathews’ confederate, the other is an honester man; he is the shepherd who lay concealed among the brambles yonder when Mathews and his bravos waited for me in this very place. He saw the fight, but having no weapon, he was wise enough to refrain from interfering in what did not concern him. He was fortunate enough, however, to pick up the shoe which came off Mathews’ foot in his hasty flight from my friend, Mr. Sheridan, so that——”
A shout of warning came from Major O’Teague’s friend, MacMahon, and the next second a sword went flashing through the air a dozen yards away, and Dick Sheridan, breathing hard, stood with his own sword in his hand. He had been just in time to disarm Mathews, who had drawn his sword and rushed with it upon Mr. Long.
And while every one stood aghast for the moment, there came forth from the plantation of trees a well-dressed lady, leading by the hand the little boy who had been on the scene before. She walked slowly across the meadow to the group, and every one looked at her.
The sword that had been jerked out of Mathews’ hand remained nodding, like a reed before the wind, with its hilt in the air, for the point had penetrated the soft turf an inch or two, at such an acute angle as made the steel top-heavy at the hilt.
No one had the presence of mind to call Mathews an assassin, but all removed their hats at the approach of the lady.
She was smiling.
“Good-morning, gentlemen,” she said, responding to their respectful salutations. “I perceive that my dear husband has been at his tricks again. He has been passing himself off at Bath as a gay bachelor, I hear, and the people were fools enough to be taken in by him; and all the time he was writing to me such loving letters, and sending them to the North to be posted. He made out that he was recruiting in Kendal, the sly rogue!”
She gave a laugh, pointing an upbraiding finger at Mathews. Clearly she was not greatly put out by anything that had yet come under her notice,—she seemed more inclined to regard the escapade of which her husband was guilty, in the light of a piece of pleasantry, to be referred to with smiles; but the only one of the party who responded to her in a like spirit was Major O’Teague.
“O madam!” he cried, “he is indeed a sad dog—quite inexcusable, madam—oh, altogether inexcusable! For I vow that, however leniently disposed his friends may have been in regard to his freak before they had seen the lady whom he forsook, they cannot condone his offence now that they have been so happy as to make her acquaintance. Madam, the man that could leave you for—for—the frivolities of Bath deserves no sympathy.”