"Do you mean to insult me, sir? I never saw you before, and did not
address you."
"I do not stand on ceremony with those who traduce my friends,"
retorted the Southerner sneeringly. "Colonel Burr is my friend--you
have maligned him."
Danvers contemptuously replied: "You seem proud of your alleged
intimacy with a notorious criminal. Perhaps you are the
Vice-President's brother, or are you his man-servant?"
The taunt raised a laugh at Arlington, who roared out:
"Burr did right in calling Hamilton to the field; he vindicated his
own honor."
"Push off! Loosen that line!" shouted the captain from the deck.
"Hurry up! blast you! we're a year behind time!"
The boat-hands made a show of haste without making speed, reluctant to
miss the chance of witnessing a fight.
"Captain Danvers, perhaps, like other Yankees, you preach against
duelling, but do not scruple to traduce men who are not present to
resent your words."
"You know my name!" cried Danvers, "but are wrong in supposing that I
will stand an affront. If you are a gentleman--"
"If? Couldn't you waive ifs and buts long enough to try the Weehauken
experiment and then investigate my pedigree? The question is, are you
a man or a dastard?"
"Swaller your fire, young salamander," broke in the captain of the
boat. "We hain't got no time to fuss nor fight duels. Push off, there,
boys! Get your poles in hand and give her a reverend set! If the
feller on shore is hankering for gore let him swim after us. Let go
that cordelle, you cussed, lazy, flat-bellied, Hockhocking idiot!
Can't you learn that a vessel won't navigate while she's tied to a
tree and stuck fast in the mud?"
Soon in midstream, the boat moved away rapidly, impelled by the triple
force of current, wind and oars, and the Virginian was jeered at from
deck and shore. It completed his mortification to observe Danvers
waving him a disdainful farewell. He returned to the tavern, paid his
reckoning, mounted his horse, and rode away dejected and miserable.
Self-disgust wrought in him a revulsion against Ohio, Marietta and the
Blennerhassetts, and caused him, for the moment, to wish he had never
met Evaleen. He rode along the village street, his mind's ear ringing
with Byle's parting advice: "Don't forget the bitters." While his
horse was trotting past a house that stood back from the street, in
the midst of shrubbery, he thought he heard his own name spoken. On
turning his head, he saw two ladies observing him from a leaf-screened
veranda. His impulse was to halt; he drew bridle, but, recalling the
scene on the wharf, he spurred on.
"My dear girl," exclaimed the elder of the two ladies, watching the
unheeding horseman, "that gentleman is Mr. Arlington or Mr.
Arlington's twin brother."
Evaleen's lips trembled as she replied hesitatingly, "It cannot be he;
he would have called. He knows we live in Marietta."
"I am sure it is Mr. Arlington, and I cannot account for his failing
to pay you his respects. He showed a decided interest in you that day
on the island. To my eye it looked very like love at first sight; and
I cannot help believing that his sole errand in Marietta is to see you
again."
Evaleen, reddening, plucked leaflets from the honeysuckle which
covered the porch.
"What am I to Mr. Arlington?"
"Perhaps more than he is to you. I wish he could have met Captain
Danvers."
Evaleen's blush faded.
"I may never see Warren again," she sighed; "he is reckless and will
not shun Spanish bullets or yellow fever. I can't bear to think of
what he must endure in the army."
"Be proud that he has gone to the war as a brave man should. I admire
men who are fearless."
"Oh, Margaret, you don't know how dear he is to me!"
"My darling, I understand. But Natchez is not out of the world, even
if the soldiers should be sent there. After all, there may be no
fighting. But I can't solve the mystery of our Virginia friend's
ungallant conduct."
Midday came and went, the afternoon wasted away, the sun set, but the
disappointing cavalier came not back to the village. Madam
Blennerhassett said no more about him, though she noticed that at
intervals Evaleen furtively glanced through an open window eastward
down the long perspective of the shaded road.