'Oh Lord, I have such a head this morning!' his lordship answered; and
he looked by no means happy. 'I am all of a twitter! It is so confounded
early, too. See here: cannot this be--?' The gentleman who had spoken before drowned his voice. 'Will this do,
sir?' he said, raising his hat, and addressing Sir George. The party had
reached a smooth glade or lawn encompassed by thick shrubs, and to all
appearance a hundred miles from a street. A fairy-ring of verdure,
glittering with sunlight and dewdrops, and tuneful with the songs of
birds, it seemed a morsel of paradise dropped from the cool blue of
heaven. Sir George felt a momentary tightening of the throat as he
surveyed its pure brilliance, and then a sudden growing anger against
the fool who had brought him thither.
'You have no second?' said the stranger.
'No,' he answered curtly; 'I think we have witnesses enough.'
'Still--if the matter can be accommodated?' 'It can,' Soane answered, standing stiffly before them. 'But only by an
unreserved apology on Mr. Dunborough's part. He struck me. I have no
more to say.' 'I do not offer the apology,' Mr. Dunborough rejoined, with a
horse-laugh. 'So we may as well go on, Jerry. I did not come here
to talk.' 'I have brought pistols,' his second said, disregarding the sneer. 'But
my principal, though the challenged party, is willing to waive the
choice of weapons.' 'Pistols will do for me,' Sir George answered.
'One shot, at a word. If ineffective, you will take to your swords,' the
second continued; and he pushed back his wig and wiped his forehead, as
if his employment were not altogether to his taste. A duel was a fine
thing--at a distance. He wished, however, that he had some one with whom
to share the responsibility, now it was come to the point; and he cast a
peevish look at Lord Almeric. But his lordship was, as he had candidly
said, 'all of a twitter,' and offered no help.
'I suppose that I am to load,' the unlucky second continued. 'That being
so, you, Sir George, must have the choice of pistols.'
Sir George bowed assent, and, going a little aside, removed his hat,
wig, and cravat; and was about to button his coat to his throat, when he
observed that Mr. Dunborough was stripping to his shirt. Too proud not
to follow the example, though prudence suggested that the white linen
made him a fair mark, he stripped also, and in a trice the two, kicking
off their shoes, moved to the positions assigned to them; and in their
breeches and laced lawn shirts, their throats bare, confronted
one another.