A Duel
D’Arnot was asleep when Tarzan entered their apartments after leaving
Rokoff’s. Tarzan did not disturb him, but the following morning he
narrated the happenings of the previous evening, omitting not a single
detail.
“What a fool I have been,” he concluded. “De Coude and his wife were
both my friends. How have I returned their friendship? Barely did I
escape murdering the count. I have cast a stigma on the name of a good
woman. It is very probable that I have broken up a happy home.”
“Do you love Olga de Coude?” asked D’Arnot.
“Were I not positive that she does not love me I could not answer your
question, Paul; but without disloyalty to her I tell you that I do not
love her, nor does she love me. For an instant we were the victims of a
sudden madness—it was not love—and it would have left us, unharmed, as
suddenly as it had come upon us even though De Coude had not returned.
As you know, I have had little experience of women. Olga de Coude is
very beautiful; that, and the dim light and the seductive surroundings,
and the appeal of the defenseless for protection, might have been
resisted by a more civilized man, but my civilization is not even skin
deep—it does not go deeper than my clothes.
“Paris is no place for me. I will but continue to stumble into more and
more serious pitfalls. The man-made restrictions are irksome. I feel
always that I am a prisoner. I cannot endure it, my friend, and so I
think that I shall go back to my own jungle, and lead the life that God
intended that I should lead when He put me there.”
“Do not take it so to heart, Jean,” responded D’Arnot. “You have
acquitted yourself much better than most ‘civilized’ men would have
under similar circumstances. As to leaving Paris at this time, I rather
think that Raoul de Coude may be expected to have something to say on
that subject before long.”
Nor was D’Arnot mistaken. A week later on Monsieur Flaubert was
announced about eleven in the morning, as D’Arnot and Tarzan were
breakfasting. Monsieur Flaubert was an impressively polite gentleman.
With many low bows he delivered Monsieur le Count de Coude’s challenge
to Monsieur Tarzan. Would monsieur be so very kind as to arrange to
have a friend meet Monsieur Flaubert at as early an hour as convenient,
that the details might be arranged to the mutual satisfaction of all
concerned?
Certainly. Monsieur Tarzan would be delighted to place his interests
unreservedly in the hands of his friend, Lieutenant D’Arnot. And so it
was arranged that D’Arnot was to call on Monsieur Flaubert at two that
afternoon, and the polite Monsieur Flaubert, with many bows, left them.
When they were again alone D’Arnot looked quizzically at Tarzan.
“Well?” he said.
“Now to my sins I must add murder, or else myself be killed,” said
Tarzan. “I am progressing rapidly in the ways of my civilized
brothers.”
“What weapons shall you select?” asked D’Arnot. “De Coude is accredited
with being a master with the sword, and a splendid shot.”
“I might then choose poisoned arrows at twenty paces, or spears at the
same distance,” laughed Tarzan. “Make it pistols, Paul.”
“He will kill you, Jean.”
“I have no doubt of it,” replied Tarzan. “I must die some day.”
“We had better make it swords,” said D’Arnot. “He will be satisfied
with wounding you, and there is less danger of a mortal wound.”
“Pistols,” said Tarzan, with finality.
D’Arnot tried to argue him out of it, but without avail, so pistols it
was.
D’Arnot returned from his conference with Monsieur Flaubert shortly
after four.
“It is all arranged,” he said. “Everything is satisfactory. Tomorrow
morning at daylight—there is a secluded spot on the road not far from
Etamps. For some personal reason Monsieur Flaubert preferred it. I did
not demur.”
“Good!” was Tarzan’s only comment. He did not refer to the matter again
even indirectly. That night he wrote several letters before he retired.
After sealing and addressing them he placed them all in an envelope
addressed to D’Arnot. As he undressed D’Arnot heard him humming a
music-hall ditty.
The Frenchman swore under his breath. He was very unhappy, for he was
positive that when the sun rose the next morning it would look down
upon a dead Tarzan. It grated upon him to see Tarzan so unconcerned.
“This is a most uncivilized hour for people to kill each other,”
remarked the ape-man when he had been routed out of a comfortable bed
in the blackness of the early morning hours. He had slept well, and so
it seemed that his head scarcely touched the pillow ere his man
deferentially aroused him. His remark was addressed to D’Arnot, who
stood fully dressed in the doorway of Tarzan’s bedroom.
D’Arnot had scarcely slept at all during the night. He was nervous, and
therefore inclined to be irritable.
“I presume you slept like a baby all night,” he said.
Tarzan laughed. “From your tone, Paul, I infer that you rather harbor
the fact against me. I could not help it, really.”
“No, Jean; it is not that,” replied D’Arnot, himself smiling. “But you
take the entire matter with such infernal indifference—it is
exasperating. One would think that you were going out to shoot at a
target, rather than to face one of the best shots in France.”
Tarzan shrugged his shoulders. “I am going out to expiate a great
wrong, Paul. A very necessary feature of the expiation is the
marksmanship of my opponent. Wherefore, then, should I be dissatisfied?
Have you not yourself told me that Count de Coude is a splendid
marksman?”
“You mean that you hope to be killed?” exclaimed D’Arnot, in horror.
“I cannot say that I hope to be; but you must admit that there is
little reason to believe that I shall not be killed.”
Had D’Arnot known the thing that was in the ape-man’s mind—that had
been in his mind almost from the first intimation that De Coude would
call him to account on the field of honor—he would have been even more
horrified than he was.
In silence they entered D’Arnot’s great car, and in similar silence
they sped over the dim road that leads to Etamps. Each man was occupied
with his own thoughts. D’Arnot’s were very mournful, for he was
genuinely fond of Tarzan. The great friendship which had sprung up
between these two men whose lives and training had been so widely
different had but been strengthened by association, for they were both
men to whom the same high ideals of manhood, of personal courage, and
of honor appealed with equal force. They could understand one another,
and each could be proud of the friendship of the other.
Tarzan of the Apes was wrapped in thoughts of the past; pleasant
memories of the happier occasions of his lost jungle life. He recalled
the countless boyhood hours that he had spent cross-legged upon the
table in his dead father’s cabin, his little brown body bent over one
of the fascinating picture books from which, unaided, he had gleaned
the secret of the printed language long before the sounds of human
speech fell upon his ears. A smile of contentment softened his strong
face as he thought of that day of days that he had had alone with Jane
Porter in the heart of his primeval forest.
Presently his reminiscences were broken in upon by the stopping of the
car—they were at their destination. Tarzan’s mind returned to the
affairs of the moment. He knew that he was about to die, but there was
no fear of death in him. To a denizen of the cruel jungle death is a
commonplace. The first law of nature compels them to cling tenaciously
to life—to fight for it; but it does not teach them to fear death.
D’Arnot and Tarzan were first upon the field of honor. A moment later
De Coude, Monsieur Flaubert, and a third gentleman arrived. The last
was introduced to D’Arnot and Tarzan; he was a physician.
D’Arnot and Monsieur Flaubert spoke together in whispers for a brief
time. The Count de Coude and Tarzan stood apart at opposite sides of
the field. Presently the seconds summoned them. D’Arnot and Monsieur
Flaubert had examined both pistols. The two men who were to face each
other a moment later stood silently while Monsieur Flaubert recited the
conditions they were to observe.
They were to stand back to back. At a signal from Monsieur Flaubert
they were to walk in opposite directions, their pistols hanging by
their sides. When each had proceeded ten paces D’Arnot was to give the
final signal—then they were to turn and fire at will until one fell, or
each had expended the three shots allowed.
While Monsieur Flaubert spoke Tarzan selected a cigarette from his
case, and lighted it. De Coude was the personification of coolness—was
he not the best shot in France?
Presently Monsieur Flaubert nodded to D’Arnot, and each man placed his
principal in position.
“Are you quite ready, gentlemen?” asked Monsieur Flaubert.
“Quite,” replied De Coude.
Tarzan nodded. Monsieur Flaubert gave the signal. He and D’Arnot
stepped back a few paces to be out of the line of fire as the men paced
slowly apart. Six! Seven! Eight! There were tears in D’Arnot’s eyes. He
loved Tarzan very much. Nine! Another pace, and the poor lieutenant
gave the signal he so hated to give. To him it sounded the doom of his
best friend.
Quickly De Coude wheeled and fired. Tarzan gave a little start. His
pistol still dangled at his side. De Coude hesitated, as though waiting
to see his antagonist crumple to the ground. The Frenchman was too
experienced a marksman not to know that he had scored a hit. Still
Tarzan made no move to raise his pistol. De Coude fired once more, but
the attitude of the ape-man—the utter indifference that was so apparent
in every line of the nonchalant ease of his giant figure, and the even
unruffled puffing of his cigarette—had disconcerted the best marksman
in France. This time Tarzan did not start, but again De Coude knew that
he had hit.
Suddenly the explanation leaped to his mind—his antagonist was coolly
taking these terrible chances in the hope that he would receive no
staggering wound from any of De Coude’s three shots. Then he would take
his own time about shooting De Coude down deliberately, coolly, and in
cold blood. A little shiver ran up the Frenchman’s spine. It was
fiendish—diabolical. What manner of creature was this that could stand
complacently with two bullets in him, waiting for the third?
And so De Coude took careful aim this time, but his nerve was gone, and
he made a clean miss. Not once had Tarzan raised his pistol hand from
where it hung beside his leg.
For a moment the two stood looking straight into each other’s eyes. On
Tarzan’s face was a pathetic expression of disappointment. On De
Coude’s a rapidly growing expression of horror—yes, of terror.
He could endure it no longer.
“Mother of God! Monsieur—shoot!” he screamed.
But Tarzan did not raise his pistol. Instead, he advanced toward De
Coude, and when D’Arnot and Monsieur Flaubert, misinterpreting his
intention, would have rushed between them, he raised his left hand in a
sign of remonstrance.
“Do not fear,” he said to them, “I shall not harm him.”
It was most unusual, but they halted. Tarzan advanced until he was
quite close to De Coude.
“There must have been something wrong with monsieur’s pistol,” he said.
“Or monsieur is unstrung. Take mine, monsieur, and try again,” and
Tarzan offered his pistol, butt foremost, to the astonished De Coude.
“_Mon Dieu_, monsieur!” cried the latter. “Are you mad?”
“No, my friend,” replied the ape-man; “but I deserve to die. It is the
only way in which I may atone for the wrong I have done a very good
woman. Take my pistol and do as I bid.”
“It would be murder,” replied De Coude. “But what wrong did you do my
wife? She swore to me that—”
“I do not mean that,” said Tarzan quickly. “You saw all the wrong that
passed between us. But that was enough to cast a shadow upon her name,
and to ruin the happiness of a man against whom I had no enmity. The
fault was all mine, and so I hoped to die for it this morning. I am
disappointed that monsieur is not so wonderful a marksman as I had been
led to believe.”
“You say that the fault was all yours?” asked De Coude eagerly.
“All mine, monsieur. Your wife is a very pure woman. She loves only
you. The fault that you saw was all mine. The thing that brought me
there was no fault of either the Countess de Coude or myself. Here is a
paper which will quite positively demonstrate that,” and Tarzan drew
from his pocket the statement Rokoff had written and signed.
De Coude took it and read. D’Arnot and Monsieur Flaubert had drawn
near. They were interested spectators of this strange ending of a
strange duel. None spoke until De Coude had quite finished, then he
looked up at Tarzan.
“You are a very brave and chivalrous gentleman,” he said. “I thank God
that I did not kill you.”
De Coude was a Frenchman. Frenchmen are impulsive. He threw his arms
about Tarzan and embraced him. Monsieur Flaubert embraced D’Arnot.
There was no one to embrace the doctor. So possibly it was pique which
prompted him to interfere, and demand that he be permitted to dress
Tarzan’s wounds.
“This gentleman was hit once at least,” he said. “Possibly thrice.”
“Twice,” said Tarzan. “Once in the left shoulder, and again in the left
side—both flesh wounds, I think.” But the doctor insisted upon
stretching him upon the sward, and tinkering with him until the wounds
were cleansed and the flow of blood checked.
One result of the duel was that they all rode back to Paris together in
D’Arnot’s car, the best of friends. De Coude was so relieved to have
had this double assurance of his wife’s loyalty that he felt no rancor
at all toward Tarzan. It is true that the latter had assumed much more
of the fault than was rightly his, but if he lied a little he may be
excused, for he lied in the service of a woman, and he lied like a
gentleman.
The ape-man was confined to his bed for several days. He felt that it
was foolish and unnecessary, but the doctor and D’Arnot took the matter
so to heart that he gave in to please them, though it made him laugh to
think of it.
“It is droll,” he said to D’Arnot. “To lie abed because of a pin prick!
Why, when Bolgani, the king gorilla, tore me almost to pieces, while I
was still but a little boy, did I have a nice soft bed to lie on? No,
only the damp, rotting vegetation of the jungle. Hidden beneath some
friendly bush I lay for days and weeks with only Kala to nurse me—poor,
faithful Kala, who kept the insects from my wounds and warned off the
beasts of prey.
“When I called for water she brought it to me in her own mouth—the only
way she knew to carry it. There was no sterilized gauze, there was no
antiseptic bandage—there was nothing that would not have driven our
dear doctor mad to have seen. Yet I recovered—recovered to lie in bed
because of a tiny scratch that one of the jungle folk would scarce
realize unless it were upon the end of his nose.”
But the time was soon over, and before he realized it Tarzan found
himself abroad again. Several times De Coude had called, and when he
found that Tarzan was anxious for employment of some nature he promised
to see what could be done to find a berth for him.
It was the first day that Tarzan was permitted to go out that he
received a message from De Coude requesting him to call at the count’s
office that afternoon.
He found De Coude awaiting him with a very pleasant welcome, and a
sincere congratulation that he was once more upon his feet. Neither had
ever mentioned the duel or the cause of it since that morning upon the
field of honor.
“I think that I have found just the thing for you, Monsieur Tarzan,”
said the count. “It is a position of much trust and responsibility,
which also requires considerably physical courage and prowess. I cannot
imagine a man better fitted than you, my dear Monsieur Tarzan, for this
very position. It will necessitate travel, and later it may lead to a
very much better post—possibly in the diplomatic service.
“At first, for a short time only, you will be a special agent in the
service of the ministry of war. Come, I will take you to the gentleman
who will be your chief. He can explain the duties better than I, and
then you will be in a position to judge if you wish to accept or no.”
De Coude himself escorted Tarzan to the office of General Rochere, the
chief of the bureau to which Tarzan would be attached if he accepted
the position. There the count left him, after a glowing description to
the general of the many attributes possessed by the ape-man which
should fit him for the work of the service.
A half hour later Tarzan walked out of the office the possessor of the
first position he had ever held. On the morrow he was to return for
further instructions, though General Rochere had made it quite plain
that Tarzan might prepare to leave Paris for an almost indefinite
period, possibly on the morrow.
It was with feelings of the keenest elation that he hastened home to
bear the good news to D’Arnot. At last he was to be of some value in
the world. He was to earn money, and, best of all, to travel and see
the world.
He could scarcely wait to get well inside D’Arnot’s sitting room before
he burst out with the glad tidings. D’Arnot was not so pleased.
“It seems to delight you to think that you are to leave Paris, and that
we shall not see each other for months, perhaps. Tarzan, you are a most
ungrateful beast!” and D’Arnot laughed.
“No, Paul; I am a little child. I have a new toy, and I am tickled to
death.”
And so it came that on the following day Tarzan left Paris en route for
Marseilles and Oran.