"FOR A BROTHER'S BLOOD."
The wind soughed mournfully through the great beech-forests which cover
the slopes leading up to the Roncevalles plateau.
It was early morning--gloomy and lowering. The two occupants of the
open carriage wending its way at a footpace up the steep mountain road
were well wrapped up, for at that elevation, late summer as it was, the
air was biting and chill.
"And so you are determined to go through with this, Orlebar?" one of
them was saying. "Can it not be arranged even now?"
"Certainly not," was the brief, determined answer. "I am going to do my
level best to rid the world of the most inhuman, damnable monster that
ever disgraced it."
"You will have to be as cool as--as this air, then, Orlebar. Your
friend--your enemy I should say rather--is something like a dead shot.
By the way, your story is one of the strangest I ever heard in my life;
and not the oddest part of it to me is that you should still persist in
choosing this place."
"Because it _is_ this place. You were here at the time of--of that
other affair, Major. You will be able to place us upon the exact spot.
I have a presentiment. On the very spot where that villain wounded my
father I shall kill him. That is why I have chosen it."
The other shook his head gravely. He was an older man than he looked--
and he looked past middle age. Major Fox's own career had been an
eventful one. He had seen active service under the flag of two foreign
powers severally, and, moreover, was reckoned an authority on hostile
meetings of a private nature, at many of which he had assisted, not
always in the character of second. That the object of this early drive
was a hostile meeting the above fragment of conversation will clearly
show.
Where is the sunny-tempered, light-hearted Philip Orlebar of old?
Dead--dead and buried. He who now sits here, pale, stern, gloomy, with
the aspect of a man upon whose life a great blow has fallen--whom that
blow has aged a dozen years at least--surely these two personalities can
have nothing in common?
Onward and upward, higher and higher wends the carriage. Then the
acclivity ends, and surmounting the roll of its brow a great flat wooded
space, with here and there the distant hump of a mountain jutting
against the sky, lies spread out in front. It is the Roncevalles
plateau.
A bell clangs forth, slow and sepulchral upon the raw morning air. Its
measured, intermittent toll, heard beneath the gloomy lour of the
overcast heavens, would be depressing enough under ordinary
circumstances. But now it strikes the hearers as immeasurably ominous,
for it is the death-toll.
Standing up, the Major, speaking in fluent French, impresses a few
directions upon the Basque driver. The latter nods and whips up his
horses. As they trot past the quaint, old-world monastery, with its red
roofs lying against an appropriate background of foliage, dark hooded
figures could be seen gliding about.
"That changes the scene again, Orlebar," remarked Major Fox. "A few
minutes ago one might almost have expected to meet Caesar and his
legions emerging from the great beech-forests. Now this brings us to
more mediaeval times again. Hallo! What is it?"
For the horses had been suddenly reined in. Then the driver drew them
up to the side of the road.
A mournful, wailing, dirgelike sound was heard in front. Standing up in
the vehicle, its occupants made out a number of white-clad figures
advancing round a bend in the road. The dark-covered horizontal burden
borne in the midst; the glitter of the crucifix moving slowly in front;
the measured and solemn chant; the clang of the bell from the tower--all
told the nature of that procession advancing along the desolate and
lonely wooded plateau. Its errand was one of death; and they, the
unlooked-for spectators, they, too, were bound upon an errand of death.
"_Requiem aeternum dona ei Domine: et lux perpetua luceat ei_" chanted
the singers. The Basque driver doffed his _beret_ and bent his head
devoutly as the _cortege_ went by, and the Major and Philip lifted their
hats. But the words, the chant, struck upon the tatter's ear with
indescribable import, for they brought back a very different scene. He
saw again the arching blue of the cloudless heavens above the Val
d'Anniviers, the rugged cliff and the feathery pine forest, the vernal
slopes and the flower-strewn graves. Again the dull roar of the
mountain torrent rose upon the air, and Alma Wyatt's voice was in his
ears as upon that glowing morning in the churchyard at Vissoye. And now
he heard it again, that chant for the dead, here in the wild solitudes
of this Pyrenean forest country, swelling through the murk of the
lowering heavens. And he himself was going forth to death--to meet
death or to deal it out to another.
"_Si iniquitates observaveris Domine: Domine quis sustinebit_!" The
chant rolled on, now sinking fainter as the funeral procession receded.
Heavens! here was a comment on the errand of hate and vengeance--the
errand of blood which had brought these two abroad that morning.
"If I were inclined to be superstitious, I should take that incident to
be unlucky," said the Major, with a jerk of his thumb in the direction
followed by the receding _cortege_, "but I'm not, so it doesn't matter.
_En avant, Michel_."
But the driver as he obeyed turned half round on his box to ask for
directions, with the result that the carriage turned abruptly off into a
bypath which penetrated deeper into the forest. A few hundred yards
along this and the Major called a halt.
"We will leave the trap here, Orlebar. The place is close at hand, and
the other party is sure to be on the spot."
"You seem to know it well, Major," said Philip. "Why, I couldn't have
ferretted it out to save my life."
"My dear fellow, I have been here before--in times past," was the
answer, given with a touch of dryness.
Voices were now heard just ahead of them, and as they emerged into a
sequestered open glade three figures were standing in a group chatting.
They belonged to Fordham and two strangers--one mustachioed and
grizzled, the other mustachioed and dark.
"Good morning--good morning," said the Major, briskly, raising his hat
as he stepped forward.
"M. le docteur Etchegaray--M. le Major Fox," introduced Fordham.
The dark stranger bowed, and the Major bowed, and there was elaborate
hat-lifting on both sides. Then the Major passed on the introduction to
his principal, to whom he further effected that of the other stranger,
who was Fordham's second, and whom he named as "M. de Verrieux."
Beyond a slight raising of the hat such as etiquette demanded, no
recognition passed between the two principals. The seconds and the
medical man drew apart for a few moments' conference.
"Is it settled that the matter is to proceed, then?" said M. de Verrieux
when this was ended. Both principals nodded. "_Enfin--a l'affaire_,"
he went on.
On one side of the glade was a great dead tree trunk blazed by
lightning. The seconds had decided to place their men twenty-five paces
apart in such wise that the white trunk should be equidistant from
either. The weapons were Colt's revolvers, but each shot was to be
fired by word of command.
The gloom of the morning deepened. A spot or two of rain fell upon the
weapons as they were handed to the principals, and the wind moaned
dismally among the tree-tops. They stood up, facing each other, those
two who had been friends. They stood up, silent, motionless as that
death which they were about to deal to each other. Again through the
murky stillness there tolled forth from the monastery tower that distant
dirge-bell.
"_Attention, messieurs_!" cried M. de Verrieux. "_Un--deux--Trois_!"
Both pistols cracked simultaneously. The hum of Philip's ball passed
just over his adversary's head. Fordham, however, without moving his
elbow from his side, had pointed his weapon almost vertically in the
air, and had pressed the trigger. He stood cool, impassive, and
motionless.
"The affair has proceeded with the greatest honour to both sides,"
declared M. de Verrieux. "We may now, I presume, consider it closed?"
"I trust so," said the Major, looking at Philip, whom he was heartily
glad to get so well out of it. But the latter, to his dismay, replied
shortly--
"By no means. I don't consider it has begun."
The seconds looked at each other, then at their principals. M. de
Verrieux shrugged his shoulders.
"_Enfin! Puisque Monsieur le desire_," he said.
"Take care he isn't committing suicide," said Fordham, with a queer
flash in his eyes, and his brows met in that extraordinarily forbidding
frown of his. But the remark was met by a somewhat sharp protest on the
part of Major Fox, who declared that it was contrary to all precedent
for one principal even to address the other under the circumstances, let
alone utter what sounded uncommonly like a taunt. Fordham recognised
frankly this infringement of etiquette, and apologised elaborately.
Again the two stood facing each other.
Never to his dying day would Philip forget that moment, and the still,
sepulchral silence of the great forest, the faint earthy smell of moist
vegetation, the sighing of the wind in the tree-tops, the mournful toll
of the far-away dirge-bell. All the events of his later life swept
through his mind in a flash--Alma Wyatt--the sweet, sunlit mountain
slopes--the blue lake, and the shining glacier--then that other in her
dark beauty--the dance and sparkle of the sea, and the expanse of yellow
sand on the low-lying Welsh coast--then the frightful disclosure--his
own horror--his father's agony--the parting--Mrs Daventer's death. All
passed before him in vivid retrospect, as he stood there to receive the
fire of the man whom up to a week ago he had reckoned his dearest
friend.
The word was given. Again both pistols cracked together. Fordham only
moving half his arm, had exactly repeated his former manoeuvre. He had
fired straight up at the sky. At the same time he was seen ever so
slightly to wince.
"Are you touched?" said the Frenchman, eagerly. "No? Ha--I thought--"
"It doesn't seem much like it," answered Fordham, slowly.
Then the seconds had their innings. On one point they were thoroughly
agreed. The affair could be allowed to go no further. It had been
conducted in a manner which was to the last degree creditable to both
gentlemen concerned, pronounced M. de Verrieux animatedly, and he
trusted they would both do each other the honour of shaking hands with
each other. After which pleasing ceremony he, the speaker, would be
delighted if they and the whole party would do him the honour of
breakfasting with him, and doing justice to the best wines the cellar of
the country inn could supply. This the Major emphatically seconded,
though he knew too well there would be no handshaking or any such
friendly parting between his two fellow-countrymen.
Philip, for his part, said nothing. The decision of the seconds was
final. Nor could he, whatever his wrongs, bring himself to go on firing
at a man who was determined not to return his fire. Even then--so
desperately contradictory is human nature--even then, without in anywise
detracting from his own wretchedness and desperation, he was conscious
of a weakness towards his old friend, a strange sense of relenting. At
that moment he rejoiced that he had not the other's death upon his
hands.
"Well, since there is to be no more shooting," said Fordham, at length,
speaking in an easy, careless tone, "I may as well convince you that I
was not bragging just now. Look at that knot in the blazed tree--there
about four feet from the ground."
He raised his pistol, and with scarcely a moment's aim fired. The knot,
a flat one, and about the size of a crown piece, was seen to splinter.
The ball had made a plumb centre.
"Look again," he went on, and again his pistol cracked. The knot split
into a gaping gash and the splinters flew from it. He had planted his
second bullet right upon the first one. Ejaculations broke from the
spectators in their respective tongues.
"Well, Mr Fordham," said the Major, "I think I may say, on behalf of my
principal and myself, that we appreciate your courtesy to the full. M.
de Verrieux, if you will do me the pleasure of meeting me this evening
or to-morrow morning at St. Jean-Pied-de-Port as arranged, we will draw
up the usual _proces-verbal_. Gentlemen, I have the honour to salute
you, and to wish you good morning."
Then, amid much elaborate hat-lifting, Major Fox and his principal
walked away, while M. de Verrieux and the doctor lit their cigars and
proceeded to put away the pistols. Suddenly a cry escaped the medico.
It was echoed by the other. For Fordham was lying on the ground as pale
as death. He was in a dead faint.
"And he said he wasn't hit?" ejaculated the doctor. "I could have sworn
I saw him wince. Yes! look there," pointing to a hole in the fallen
man's trousers just above the left knee. "There it is. He held his
hand over it all the time, do you see, very cleverly too. Too proud to
give way before the young one. Well, well; he _is_ a man. But it is
wonderful--wonderful."
All this while the speaker had been ripping up the leg of the prostrate
man's trousers.
"Here it is," he went on triumphantly. "_Ah, ca_! But there will be no
probing required. The ball has gone clean through."
"Is the wound a dangerous one?" said the other. "It doesn't seem to
bleed much."
"_C'est selon_!" replied the doctor, with a shrug of the shoulders.
"The haemorrhage is, as you say, slight; but the tendon is badly torn--
and--_he will carry the mark of this day with him to his grave. He will
walk with a limp for the remainder of his life_."
And Fordham waking up just then to consciousness under the influence of
the cordial which his second was administering, heard the words, and
smiled grimly to himself.
"Poetic justice, with a vengeance!" he thought.