“Why didn’t you trust me?” I said, bitterly. “How could you doubt what
I would do? I trusted you. From the moment you came riding toward me,
I thanked God for the sight of such a woman. For making anything so
beautiful.”
I stopped, for I saw I had again offended. At the words she drew back
quickly, and her eyes shone with indignation. She looked at me as though
I had tried to touch her with my hand. But I spoke on without heeding
her. I repeated the words with which I had offended.
“Yes,” I said, “I thanked God for anything so noble and so beautiful. To
me, you could do no wrong. But you! You judged me before you even knew
my name. You said I was a cad who went about armed to fight unarmed
men. To you I was a coward who could be frightened off by a tale of
bulls-eyes, and broken pipe-stems at a Paris fair. What do I care for
your brother’s tricks. Let him see my score cards at West Point. He’ll
find them framed on the walls. I was first a coward and a cad, and now
I am a bully and a hired assassin. From the first, you and your brother
have laughed at me and mine while all I asked of you was to be what you
seemed to be, what I was happy to think you were. I wanted to believe
in you. Why did you show me that you can be selfish and unfeeling? It is
you who do not understand. You understand so little,” I cried, “that I
pity you from the bottom of my heart. I give you my word, I pity you.”
“Stop,” she commanded. I drew back and bowed, and we stood confronting
each other in silence.
“And they call you a brave man,” she said at last, speaking slowly and
steadily, as though she were picking each word. “It is like a brave man
to insult a woman, because she wants to save her brother’s life.”
When I raised my face it was burning, as though she had thrown vitriol.
“If I have insulted you, Miss Fiske,” I said, “if I have ever insulted
any woman, I hope to God that to-morrow morning your brother will kill
me.”
When I turned and looked back at her from the door, she was leaning
against one of the pillars with her face bent in her hands, and weeping
bitterly.
I rode to the barracks and spent several hours in writing a long letter
to Beatrice. I felt a great need to draw near to her. I was confused and
sore and unhappy, and although nothing of this, nor of the duel appeared
in my letter, I was comforted to think that I was writing it to her. It
was good to remember that there was such a woman in the world, and when
I compared her with the girl from whom I had just parted, I laughed out
loud.
And yet I knew that had I put the case to Beatrice, she would have
discovered something to present in favor of Miss Fiske.
“She was pleading for her brother, and she did not understand,” Beatrice
would have said. But in my own heart I could find no excuse. Her family
had brought me nothing but evil. Because her father would not pay his
debts, I had been twice wounded and many times had risked death; the
son had struck me with a whip in the public streets, and the sister
had called me everything that is contemptible, from a cad to a hired
cut-throat. So, I was done with the house of Fiske. My hand was against
it. I owed it nothing.
But with all my indignation against them, for which there was reason
enough, I knew in my heart that I had looked up to them, and stood in
awe of them, for reasons that made me the cad they called me. Ever since
my arrival in Honduras I had been carried away by the talk of the Fiske
millions, and later by the beauty of the girl, and by the boy’s insolent
air, of what I accepted as good breeding. I had been impressed with his
five years in Paris, by the cut of his riding-clothes even, by the fact
that he owned a yacht. I had looked up to them, because they belonged to
a class who formed society, as I knew society through the Sunday papers.
And now these superior beings had rewarded my snobbishness by acting
toward me in a way that was contrary to every ideal I held of what
was right and decent. For such as these, I had felt ashamed of my old
comrades. It was humiliating, but it was true; and as I admitted this
to myself, my cheeks burned in the darkness, and I buried my face in
the pillow. For some time I lay awake debating fiercely in my mind as to
whether, when I faced young Fiske, I should shoot the pistol out of his
hand, or fire into the ground. And it was not until I had decided that
the latter act would better show our contempt for him and his insult,
that I fell asleep.
Von Ritter and Miller woke me at four o’clock. They were painfully
correct and formal. Miller had even borrowed something of the Baron’s
manner, which sat upon him as awkwardly as would a wig and patches. I
laughed at them both, but, for the time being, they had lost their sense
of humor; and we drank our coffee in a constrained and sleepy silence.
At the graveyard we found that Fiske, his two seconds, Graham and
Lowell, the young Middy, and a local surgeon had already arrived. We
exchanged bows and salutes gloomily and the seconds gathered together,
and began to talk in hoarse whispers. It was still very dark. The moon
hung empty and pallid above the cold outline of the hills, and although
the roosters were crowing cheerfully, the sun had not yet risen. In the
hollows the mists lay like lakes, and every stone and rock was wet and
shining as though it had been washed in readiness for the coming day.
The gravestones shone upon us like freshly scrubbed doorsteps. It was
a most dismal spot, and I was so cold that I was afraid I would shiver,
and Fiske might think I was nervous. So I moved briskly about among
the graves, reading the inscriptions on the tombstones. Under the
circumstances the occupation, to a less healthy mind, would have been
depressing. My adversary, so it seemed to me, carried himself with a
little too much unconcern. It struck me that he overdid it. He laughed
with the local surgeon, and pointed out the moon and the lakes of mist
as though we had driven out to observe the view. I could not think of
anything to do which would show that I was unconcerned too, so I got
back into the carriage and stretched my feet out to the seat opposite,
and continued to smoke my cigar.
Incidentally, by speaking to Lowell, I hurt Von Ritter’s feelings. It
seems that as one of the other man’s seconds I should have been more
haughty with him. But when he passed me, pacing out the ground, he
saluted stiffly, and as I saluted back, I called out: “I suppose you
know you’ll catch it if they find out about this at Washington?” And he
answered, with a grin: “Yes, I know, but I couldn’t get out of it.”
“Neither could I,” I replied, cheerfully, and in so loud a tone that
everyone heard me. Von Ritter was terribly annoyed.
At last all was arranged and we took our places. We were to use pistols.
They were double-barrelled affairs, with very fine hair-triggers. Graham
was to give the word by asking if we were ready, and was then to count
“One, two, three.”
After the word “one” we could fire when we pleased. When each of us had
emptied both barrels, our honor was supposed to be satisfied.
Young Fiske wore a blue yachting suit with the collar turned up, and no
white showing except his face, and that in the gray light of the dawn
was a sickly white, like the belly of a fish. After he had walked to his
mark he never took his eyes from me. They seemed to be probing around
under my uniform for the vulnerable spot. I had never before had anyone
look at me, who seemed to so frankly dislike me.
Curiously enough, I kept thinking of the story of the man who boasted he
was so good a shot that he could break the stem of a wine-glass, and how
someone said: “Yes, but the wine-glass isn’t holding a pistol.” Then,
while I was smiling at the application I had made of this story to
my scowling adversary, there came up a picture, not of home and of
Beatrice, nor of my past sins, but of the fellow’s sister as I last saw
her in the moonlight, leaning against the pillar of the balcony with
her head bowed in her hands. And at once it all seemed contemptible and
cruel. No quarrel in the world, so it appeared to me then, was worth
while if it were going to make a woman suffer. And for an instant I was
so indignant with Fiske for having dragged me into this one, to feed his
silly vanity, that for a moment I felt like walking over and giving him
a sound thrashing. But at the instant I heard Graham demand, “Are you
ready?” and I saw Fiske fasten his eyes on mine, and nod his head. The
moment had come.
“One,” Graham counted, and at the word Fiske threw up his gun and fired,
and the ball whistled past my ear. My pistol was still hanging at my
side, so I merely pulled the trigger, and the ball went into the ground.
But instantly I saw my mistake. Shame and consternation were written
on the faces of my two seconds, and to the face of Fiske there came a
contemptuous smile. I at once understood my error. I read what was in
the mind of each. They dared to think I had pulled the trigger through
nervousness, that I had fired before I was ready, that I was frightened
and afraid. I am sure I never was so angry in my life, and I would have
cried out to them, if a movement on the part of Fiske had not sobered
me. Still smiling, he lifted his pistol slightly and aimed for, so it
seemed to me, some seconds, and then fired.
I felt the bullet cut the lining of my tunic and burn the flesh over
my ribs, and the warm blood tickling my side, but I was determined he
should not know he had hit me, and not even my lips moved.
Then a change, so sudden and so remarkable, came over the face of
young Fiske, that its very agony fascinated me. At first it was
incomprehensible, and then I understood. He had fired his last shot, he
thought he had missed, and he was waiting for me, at my leisure, to kill
him with my second bullet.
I raised the pistol, and it was as though you could hear the silence.
Every waking thing about us seemed to suddenly grow still. I brought the
barrel slowly to a level with his knee, raised it to his heart, passed
it over his head, and, aiming in the air, fired at the moon, and then
tossed the gun away. The waking world seemed to breathe again, and
from every side there came a chorus of quick exclamations; but without
turning to note who made them, nor what they signified, I walked back to
the carriage, and picked up my cigar. It was still burning.
Von Ritter ran to the side of the carriage.
“You must wait,” he protested. “Mr. Fiske wishes to shake hands with
you. It is not finished yet.”
“Yes, it is finished,” I replied, savagely. “I have humored you two long
enough. A pest on both your houses. I’m going back to breakfast.”
Poor Von Ritter drew away, deeply hurt and scandalized, but my offence
was nothing to the shock he received when young Lowell ran to the
carriage and caught up my hand. He looked at me with a smile that would
have softened a Spanish duenna.
“See here!” he cried. “Whether you like it or not, you’ve got to shake
hands with me. I want to tell you that was one of the finest things I
ever saw.” He squeezed my fingers until the bones crunched together.
“I’ve heard a lot about you, and now I believe all I’ve heard. To stand
up there,” he ran on, breathlessly, “knowing you didn’t mean to
fire, and knowing he was a dead shot, and make a canvas target of
yourself--that was bully. You were an ass to do it, but it was great.
You going back to breakfast?” he demanded, suddenly, with the same
winning, eager smile. “So am I. I speak to go with you.”
Before I could reply he had vaulted into the carriage, and was shouting
at the driver.
“Cochero, to the Barracks. Full speed ahead. Vamoose. Give way. Allez
vite!”
“But my seconds,” I protested.
“They can walk,” he said.
Already the horses were at a gallop, and as we swung around the wall
of the graveyard and were hidden from the sight of the others, Lowell
sprang into the seat beside me. With the quick fingers of the sailor, he
cast off my sword-belt and tore open my blouse.
“I wanted to get you away,” he muttered, “before he found out he had hit
you.”
“I’m not hit,” I protested.
“Just as you like,” he said. “Still, it looks rather damp to the left
here.”
But, as I knew, the bullet had only grazed me, and the laugh of relief
Lowell gave when he raised his head, and said, “Why, it’s only a
scratch,” meant as much to me as though he had rendered me some great
service. For it seemed to prove a genuine, friendly concern, and no
one, except Laguerre, had shown that for me since I had left home. I had
taken a fancy to Lowell from the moment he had saluted me like a brother
officer in the Plaza, and I had wished he would like me. I liked him
better than any other young man I had ever met. I had never had a man
for a friend, but before we had finished breakfast I believe we were
better friends than many boys who had lived next door to each other from
the day they were babies.
As a rule, I do not hit it off with men, so I felt that his liking me
was a great piece of good fortune, and a great honor. He was only three
years older than myself, but he knew much more about everything than
I did, and his views of things were as fine and honorable as they were
amusing.
Since then we have grown to be very close friends indeed, and we have
ventured together into many queer corners, but I have never ceased to
admire him, and I have always found him the same--unconscious of himself
and sufficient to himself. I mean that if he were presented to an
Empress he would not be impressed, nor if he chatted with a bar-maid
would he be familiar. He would just look at each of them with his grave
blue eyes and think only of what she was saying, and not at all of what
sort of an impression he was making, or what she thought of him. Aiken
helped me a lot by making me try not to be like Aiken; Lowell helped me
by making me wish to be like Lowell.
We had a very merry breakfast, and the fact that it was seven in the
morning did not in the least interfere with our drinking each other’s
health in a quart of champagne. Nearly all of our officers came in while
we were at breakfast to learn if I were still alive, and Lowell gave
them most marvellous accounts of the affair, sometimes representing me
as an idiot and sometimes as an heroic martyr.
They all asked him if he thought Fiske had sufficient influence at
Washington to cause the Government to give him the use of the Raleigh
against us, but he would only laugh and shake his head.
Later, to Laguerre, he talked earnestly on the same subject, and much to
the point.
The news of the duel had reached the palace at eight o’clock, and the
president at once started for the barracks.
We knew he was coming when we heard the people in the cafes shouting
“Viva,” as they always did when he appeared in public, and, though I was
badly frightened as to what he would say to me, I ran to the door and
turned out the guard to receive him.
He had put on one of the foreign uniforms he was entitled to wear--he
did not seem to fancy the one I had designed--and as he rode across the
Plaza I thought I had never seen a finer soldier. Lowell said he looked
like a field marshal of the Second Empire. I was glad Lowell had come
to the door with me, as he could now see for himself that my general was
one for whom a man might be proud to fight a dozen duels.
The president gave his reins to an orderly and mounted the steps,
touching his chapeau to the salute of guard and the shouting citizens,
but his eyes were fixed sternly on me. I saw that he was deeply moved,
and I wished fervently, now that it was too late, that I had told him
of the street fight at the time, and not allowed him to hear of it
from others. I feared the worst. I was prepared for any reproof, any
punishment, even the loss of my commission, and I braced myself for his
condemnation.
But when he reached the top step where I stood at salute, although I was
inwardly quaking, he halted and his lips suddenly twisted, and the tears
rushed to his eyes.
He tried to speak, but made only a choking, inarticulate sound, and
then, with a quick gesture, before all the soldiers and all the people,
he caught me in his arms.
“My boy,” he whispered, “my boy! For you were lost,” he murmured, “and
have returned to me.”
I heard Lowell running away, and the door of the guard-room banging
behind him, I heard the cheers of the people who, it seems, already knew
of the duel and understood the tableau on the barrack steps, but
the thought that Laguerre cared for me even as a son made me deaf to
everything, and my heart choked with happiness.
It passed in a moment, and in manner he was once more my superior
officer, but the door he had opened was never again wholly shut to me.
In the guard-room I presented Lowell to the president, and I was proud
to see the respect with which Lowell addressed him. At the first glance
they seemed to understand each other, and they talked together as simply
as would friends of long acquaintance.
After they had spoken of many things, Laguerre said: “Would it be fair
for me to ask you, Mr. Lowell, what instructions the United States has
given your commanding officer in regard to our government?”
To this Lowell answered: “All I know, sir, is that when we arrived at
Amapala, Captain Miller telegraphed the late president, Doctor Alvarez,
that we were here to protect American interests. But you probably know,”
he added, “as everyone else does, that we came here because the Isthmian
Line demanded protection.”
“Yes, so I supposed,” Laguerre replied. “But I understand Mr. Graham has
said that when Mr. Fiske gives the word Captain Miller will land your
marines and drive us out of the country.”
Lowell shrugged his shoulders and frowned.
“Mr. Graham--” he began, “is Mr. Graham.” He added: “Captain Miller is
not taking orders from civilians, and he depends on his own sources
for information. I am here because he sent me to ‘Go, look, see,’ and
report. I have been wiring him ever since you started from the coast,
and since you became president. Your censor has very kindly allowed me
to use our cipher.”