THE day was just breaking over that wide flat beside the Rhine at Basle,
as two men, descending from a carriage on the high road, took one of the
narrow paths which lead through the fields, walking slowly, and talking
to each other in the careless tone of easy converse.
“We are early, Barnard, I should say; fully half an hour before our
time,” said Calvert, as he walked on first, for the path did not admit
of two abreast. “What grand things these great plains are, traversed by a
fine river, and spreading away to a far distant horizon. What a sense of
freedom they inspire; how suggestive they are of liberty; don’t you feel
that?”
“I think I see them coming,” said the other. “I saw a carriage descend
the hill yonder. Is there nothing else you have to say--nothing that you
think of, Harry?”
“Nothing. If it should be a question of a funeral, Bob, my funds will
show how economically it must be done; but even if I had been richer, it
is not an occasion I should like to make costly.”
“It was not of that I was thinking. It was of friends or relations.”
“My dear fellow, I have few relatives and no friends. No man’s
executorship will ever entail less trouble than mine. I have nothing to
leave, nor any to leave it to.”
“But these letters--the cause of the present meeting--don’t you intend
that in case of--in the event of--”
“My being killed. Go on.”
“That they should be given up to your cousin?”
“Nothing of the kind ever occurred to me. In the first place, I don’t
mean to be shot; and in the second, I have not the very remotest
intention of releasing the dear Sophy from those regrets and sorrows
which she ought to feel for my death. Nay, I mean her to mourn me with a
degree of affliction to which anxiety will add the poignancy.”
“This is not generous, Calvert.”
“I’m sure it’s not. Why, my dear friend, were I to detect any such
weakness in my character, I’d begin to fancy I might end by becoming a
poltroon.”
“Is that your man--he in the cloak--or the tall one behind him?” said
Barnard, as he pointed to a group who came slowly along through a
vineyard.
“I cannot say. I never saw Mr. Graham to my knowledge. Don’t let them be
long about the preliminaries, Bob; the morning is fresh and the ground
here somewhat damp. Agree to all they ask, distance and everything, only
secure that the word be given by you. Remember that, in the way I’ve
told you.”
As Calvert strolled listlessly along towards the river, Barnard advanced
to meet the others, who, to the number of five, came now forward.
Colonel Rochefort, Mr. Graham’s friend, and Barnard were slightly
acquainted, and turned aside to talk to each other in confidence.
“It is scarcely the moment to hope for it, Mr. Barnard,” said the other,
“but I cannot go on without asking, at least, if there is any peaceful
settlement possible?”
“I fear not. You told me last night that all retraction by your friend
of his offensive letter was impossible.”
“Utterly so.”
“What, then, would you suggest?”
“Could not Mr. Calvert be brought to see that it was he who gave the
first offence? That, in writing, as he did, to a man in my friend’s
position--”
“Mere waste of time, colonel, to discuss this; besides, I think we have
each of us already said all that we could on this question, and Calvert
is very far from being satisfied with me for having allowed myself to
entertain it There is really nothing for it but a shot.”
“Yes, Sir; but you seem to forget, if we proceed to this arbitrament, it
is not a mere exchange of fire will satisfy my friend.”
“We are, as regards that, completely at his service; and if your supply
of ammunition be only in proportion to the number of your followers, you
can scarcely be disappointed.”
The colonel reddened deeply, and in a certain irritation replied: “One
of these gentlemen is a travelling companion of my friend, whose health
is too delicate to permit him to act for him; the other is a French
officer of rank, who dined with us yesterday; the third is a surgeon.”
“To us it is a matter of perfect indifference if you come accompanied
by fifty, or five hundred; but let us lose no more time. I see how I am
trying my friend’s patience already. Ten paces, short paces, too,” began
Barnard as he took his friend’s arm.
“And the word?”
“I am to give it.”
“All right; and you remember how?”
“Yes! the word is, One--two; at the second you are to fire.”
“Let me hear you say them.”
“One--two.”
“No, no; that’s not it. One-two--sharp; don’t dwell on the interval;
make them like syllables of one word.”
“One-two.”
“Yes, that’s it; and remember that you cough once before you begin.
There, don’t let them see us talking together. Give me a shake hands,
and leave me.”
“That man is nervous, or I am much mistaken,” said Graham’s invalid
friend to the colonel; and they both looked towards Calvert, who with
his hat drawn down over his brows, walked lazily to his ground.
“It is not the reputation he has,” whispered the colonel. “Be calm,
Graham; be as cool as the other fellow.”
The principals were now placed, and the others fell back on either side,
and almost instantaneously, so instantaneously, indeed, that Colonel
Rochefort had not yet ceased to walk, two shots rang out one distinctly
before the other, and Graham fell.
All ran towards him but Calvert, who, throwing his pistol at his feet,
stood calm and erect. For a few seconds they bent down over the wounded
man, and then Barnard, hastening back to his friend, whispered, “Through
the chest; it is all over.”
“Dead?” said the other.
He nodded, and taking his arm, said, “Don’t lose a moment; the Frenchman
says you have not an instant to spare.”
For a moment Calvert moved as if going towards the others, then, as if
with a changed purpose, he turned sharply round and walked towards the
high road.
As Calvert was just about to gain the road, Barnard ran after him, and
cried out, “Stop, Calvert, hear what these men say; they are crying out
unfair against us. They declare--”
“Are you an ass, Bob?” said the other, angrily. “Who minds the stupid
speech of fellows whose friend is knocked over?”
“Yes, but I’ll hear this out,” cried Barnard.
“You’ll do so without _me_, then, and a cursed fool you are for your
pains. Drive across to the Bavarian frontier, my man,” said he, giving
the postilion a Napoleon, “and you shall have a couple more if you get
there within two hours.”
With all the speed that whip and spur could summon, the beasts sped
along the level road, and Calvert, though occasionally looking through
the small pane in the back of the carriage to assure himself he was not
pursued, smoked on unceasingly. He might have been a shade graver than
his wont, and preoccupied too, for he took no notice of the objects
on the road, nor replied to the speeches of the postilion, who, in his
self-praise, seemed to call for some expression of approval.
“You are a precious fool, Master Barnard, and you have paid for your
folly, or you had been here before this.”
Such were his uttered thoughts, but it cost him little regret as he
spoke them.
The steam-boat that left Constance for Lindau was just getting under
weigh as he reached the lake, and he immediately embarked in her, and
on the same evening, gained Austrian territory at Bregenz, to pass the
night For a day or two, the quietness of this lone and little-visited
spot suited him, and it was near enough to the Swiss frontier, at the
Rhine, to get news from Switzerland. On the third day, a paragraph in
the Basle Zeitung told him everything. It was, as such things usually
are, totally misrepresented, but there was enough revealed for him to
guess what had occurred. It was headed “Terrible Event,” and ran thus:
“At a meeting which took place with pistols, this morning,
between two English lords at the White Meadows, one fell so
fatally wounded that his death ensued in a few minutes. An
instantaneous cry of foul play amongst his friends led to a
fierce and angry altercation, which ended in a second
encounter between the first principal and the second of the
deceased. In this the former was shot through the throat,
the bullet injuring several large vessels, and lodging, it
is supposed, in the spine. He has been conveyed to the Hôtel
Royal, but no hopes of his recovery are entertained.”
“I suspected what would come of your discussion, Bob. Had you only been
minded to slip away with me, you’d have been in the enjoyment of a whole
skin by this time. I wonder which of them shot him. I’d take the odds
it was the Frenchman; he handled the pistols like a fellow who envied us
our pleasant chances. I suppose I ought to write to Barnard, or to his
people; but it’s not an agreeable task, and I’ll think over it.”
He thought over it, and wrote as follows:
“Dear Bob,--I suspect, from a very confused paragraph in a
stupid newspaper, that you have fought somebody and got
wounded. Write and say if this be so what it was all about,
who did it, and what more can be done for you,
“By yours truly,
“H.C.
“Address, Como.”
To this he received no answer when he called at the post-office, and
turned his steps next to Orta. He did not really know why, but it was,
perhaps, with some of that strange instinct that makes the criminal
haunt the homes of those he has once injured, and means to injure more.
There was, however, one motive which he recognised himself; he wished to
know something of those at the villa; when they had heard from Loyd, and
what? whether, too, they had heard of his own doings, and in what way?
A fatal duel, followed by another that was like to prove fatal, was
an event sure to provoke newspaper notice. The names could not escape
publicity, and he was eager to see in what terms they mentioned his own.
He trusted much to the difficulty of getting at any true version of the
affair, and he doubted greatly if anyone but Graham and himself could
have told why they were to meet at all. Graham’s second, Rochefort,
evidently knew very little of the affair. At all events, Graham was no
longer there to give his version, while for the incidents of the duel,
who was to speak? All, save Barnard, who was dying, if not dead, must
have taken flight The Swiss authorities would soon have arrested them if
within reach. He might therefore reassure himself that no statement that
he could not at least impugn could get currency just yet “I will row
over to the old Grainger”--so he called her--“and see what she has Heard
of it all.”
It was nightfall as he reached the shore, and walked slowly and
anxiously to the house. He had learned at Orta that they were to leave
that part of the world in another fortnight, but whither for none knew.
As he drew nigh, he determined to have a peep at the interior before he
presented himself. He accordingly opened the little wicket noiselessly,
and passed round through the flower-garden till he reached the windows
of the drawing-room.