Barely had Sheldon reached the Balesuna, when he heard the faint report
of a distant rifle and knew it was the signal of Tudor, giving notice
that he had reached the Berande, turned about, and was coming back.
Sheldon fired his rifle into the air in answer, and in turn proceeded to
advance. He moved as in a dream, absent-mindedly keeping to the open
beach. The thing was so preposterous that he had to struggle to realize
it, and he reviewed in his mind the conversation with Tudor, trying to
find some clue to the common-sense of what he was doing. He did not want
to kill Tudor. Because that man had blundered in his love-making was no
reason that he, Sheldon, should take his life. Then what was it all
about? True, the fellow had insulted Joan by his subsequent remarks and
been knocked down for it, but because he had knocked him down was no
reason that he should now try to kill him.
In this fashion he covered a quarter of the distance between the two
rivers, when it dawned upon him that Tudor was not on the beach at all.
Of course not. He was advancing, according to the terms of the
agreement, in the shelter of the cocoanut trees. Sheldon promptly
swerved to the left to seek similar shelter, when the faint crack of a
rifle came to his ears, and almost immediately the bullet, striking the
hard sand a hundred feet beyond him, ricochetted and whined onward on a
second flight, convincing him that, preposterous and unreal as it was, it
was nevertheless sober fact. It had been intended for him. Yet even
then it was hard to believe. He glanced over the familiar landscape and
at the sea dimpling in the light but steady breeze. From the direction
of Tulagi he could see the white sails of a schooner laying a tack across
toward Berande. Down the beach a horse was grazing, and he idly wondered
where the others were. The smoke rising from the copra-drying caught his
eyes, which roved on over the barracks, the tool-houses, the boat-sheds,
and the bungalow, and came to rest on Joan's little grass house in the
corner of the compound.
Keeping now to the shelter of the trees, he went forward another quarter
of a mile. If Tudor had advanced with equal speed they should have come
together at that point, and Sheldon concluded that the other was
circling. The difficulty was to locate him. The rows of trees, running
at right angles, enabled him to see along only one narrow avenue at a
time. His enemy might be coming along the next avenue, or the next, to
right or left. He might be a hundred feet away or half a mile. Sheldon
plodded on, and decided that the old stereotyped duel was far simpler and
easier than this protracted hide-and-seek affair. He, too, tried
circling, in the hope of cutting the other's circle; but, without
catching a glimpse of him, he finally emerged upon a fresh clearing where
the young trees, waist-high, afforded little shelter and less hiding.
Just as he emerged, stepping out a pace, a rifle cracked to his right,
and though he did not hear the bullet in passing, the thud of it came to
his ears when it struck a palm-trunk farther on.
He sprang back into the protection of the larger trees. Twice he had
exposed himself and been fired at, while he had failed to catch a single
glimpse of his antagonist. A slow anger began to burn in him. It was
deucedly unpleasant, he decided, this being peppered at; and nonsensical
as it really was, it was none the less deadly serious. There was no
avoiding the issue, no firing in the air and getting over with it as in
the old-fashioned duel. This mutual man-hunt must keep up until one got
the other. And if one neglected a chance to get the other, that
increased the other's chance to get him. There could be no false
sentiment about it. Tudor had been a cunning devil when he proposed this
sort of duel, Sheldon concluded, as he began to work along cautiously in
the direction of the last shot.
When he arrived at the spot, Tudor was gone, and only his foot-prints
remained, pointing out the course he had taken into the depths of the
plantation. Once, ten minutes later, he caught a glimpse of Tudor, a
hundred yards away, crossing the same avenue as himself but going in the
opposite direction. His rifle half-leaped to his shoulder, but the other
was gone. More in whim than in hope of result, grinning to himself as he
did so, Sheldon raised his automatic pistol and in two seconds sent eight
shots scattering through the trees in the direction in which Tudor had
disappeared. Wishing he had a shot-gun, Sheldon dropped to the ground
behind a tree, slipped a fresh clip up the hollow butt of the pistol,
threw a cartridge into the chamber, shoved the safety catch into place,
and reloaded the empty clip.
It was but a short time after that that Tudor tried the same trick on
him, the bullets pattering about him like spiteful rain, thudding into
the palm trunks, or glancing off in whining ricochets. The last bullet
of all, making a double ricochet from two different trees and losing most
of its momentum, struck Sheldon a sharp blow on the forehead and dropped
at his feet. He was partly stunned for the moment, but on investigation
found no greater harm than a nasty lump that soon rose to the size of a
pigeon's egg.
The hunt went on. Once, coming to the edge of the grove near the
bungalow, he saw the house-boys and the cook, clustered on the back
veranda and peering curiously among the trees, talking and laughing with
one another in their queer falsetto voices. Another time he came upon a
working-gang busy at hoeing weeds. They scarcely noticed him when he
came up, though they knew thoroughly well what was going on. It was no
affair of theirs that the enigmatical white men should be out trying to
kill each other, and whatever interest in the proceedings might be theirs
they were careful to conceal it from Sheldon. He ordered them to
continue hoeing weeds in a distant and out-of-the-way corner, and went on
with the pursuit of Tudor.
Tiring of the endless circling, Sheldon tried once more to advance
directly on his foe, but the latter was too crafty, taking advantage of
his boldness to fire a couple of shots at him, and slipping away on some
changed and continually changing course. For an hour they dodged and
turned and twisted back and forth and around, and hunted each other among
the orderly palms. They caught fleeting glimpses of each other and
chanced flying shots which were without result. On a grassy shelter
behind a tree, Sheldon came upon where Tudor had rested and smoked a
cigarette. The pressed grass showed where he had sat. To one side lay
the cigarette stump and the charred match which had lighted it. In front
lay a scattering of bright metallic fragments. Sheldon recognized their
significance. Tudor was notching his steel-jacketed bullets, or cutting
them blunt, so that they would spread on striking--in short, he was
making them into the vicious dum-dum prohibited in modern warfare.
Sheldon knew now what would happen to him if a bullet struck his body. It
would leave a tiny hole where it entered, but the hole where it emerged
would be the size of a saucer.
He decided to give up the pursuit, and lay down in the grass, protected
right and left by the row of palms, with on either hand the long avenue
extending. This he could watch. Tudor would have to come to him or else
there would be no termination of the affair. He wiped the sweat from his
face and tied the handkerchief around his neck to keep off the stinging
gnats that lurked in the grass. Never had he felt so great a disgust for
the thing called "adventure." Joan had been bad enough, with her Baden-
Powell and long-barrelled Colt's; but here was this newcomer also looking
for adventure, and finding it in no other way than by lugging a peace-
loving planter into an absurd and preposterous bush-whacking duel. If
ever adventure was well damned, it was by Sheldon, sweating in the
windless grass and fighting gnats, the while he kept close watch up and
down the avenue.
Then Tudor came. Sheldon happened to be looking in his direction at the
moment he came into view, peering quickly up and down the avenue before
he stepped into the open. Midway he stopped, as if debating what course
to pursue. He made a splendid mark, facing his concealed enemy at two
hundred yards' distance. Sheldon aimed at the centre of his chest, then
deliberately shifted the aim to his right shoulder, and, with the
thought, "That will put him out of business," pulled the trigger. The
bullet, driving with momentum sufficient to perforate a man's body a mile
distant, struck Tudor with such force as to pivot him, whirling him half
around by the shock of its impact and knocking him down.
"'Hope I haven't killed the beggar," Sheldon muttered aloud, springing to
his feet and running forward.
A hundred feet away all anxiety on that score was relieved by Tudor, who
made shift with his left hand, and from his automatic pistol hurled a
rain of bullets all around Sheldon. The latter dodged behind a palm
trunk, counting the shots, and when the eighth had been fired he rushed
in on the wounded man. He kicked the pistol out of the other's hand, and
then sat down on him in order to keep him down.
"Be quiet," he said. "I've got you, so there's no use struggling."
Tudor still attempted to struggle and to throw him off.
"Keep quiet, I tell you," Sheldon commanded. "I'm satisfied with the
outcome, and you've got to be. So you might as well give in and call
this affair closed."
Tudor reluctantly relaxed.
"Rather funny, isn't it, these modern duels?" Sheldon grinned down at
him as he removed his weight. "Not a bit dignified. If you'd struggled
a moment longer I'd have rubbed your face in the earth. I've a good mind
to do it anyway, just to teach you that duelling has gone out of fashion.
Now let us see to your injuries."
"You only got me that last," Tudor grunted sullenly, "lying in ambush
like--"
"Like a wild Indian. Precisely. You've caught the idea, old man."
Sheldon ceased his mocking and stood up. "You lie there quietly until I
send back some of the boys to carry you in. You're not seriously hurt,
and it's lucky for you I didn't follow your example. If you had been
struck with one of your own bullets, a carriage and pair would have been
none too large to drive through the hole it would have made. As it is,
you're drilled clean--a nice little perforation. All you need is
antiseptic washing and dressing, and you'll be around in a month. Now
take it easy, and I'll send a stretcher for you."