Sir Jasper stretched a hand to each; and holding him by the elbows they entered his private apartment and closed the door with such carefulness that the tall footman had no choice but to take it in turns to listen and peep through the key-hole.
"Tom," said Sir Jasper, "Colonel Villiers, when I begged you to favour me with this interview, I was anxious for your services because, as I told you, of a strong suspicion of Lady Standish's infidelity to me. Now, gentlemen, doubt is no longer possible, I have the proofs!"
"Come, come, Jasper, never be down-hearted," cried jovial Tom Stafford. "Come, sir, you have been too fond of the little dears in your day not to know what tender yielding creatures they are. 'Tis their nature man; and then, must they not follow the mode? Do you want to be the only husband in Bath whose wife is not in the fashion? Tut, tut, so long as you can measure a sword for it and let a little blood, why, 'tis all in the day's fun!"
"Swords?" gurgled Colonel Villiers. "No, no, pistols are the thing, boy. You are never sure with your sword: 'tis but a dig in the ribs, a slash in the arm, and your pretty fellow looks all the prettier for his pallor, and is all the more likely to get prompt consolation in the proper quarter. Ha!"
"Consolation!" cried Sir Jasper, as if the word were a blow. "Ay, consolation! damnation!"
"Whereas with your bullet," said the Colonel, "in the lungs, or in the brain—at your choice—the job is done as neat as can be. Are you a good hand at the barkers, Jasper?"
"Oh, I can hit a haystack!" said Sir Jasper. But he spoke vaguely.
"I am for the swords, whenever you can," cried comely Stafford, crossing a pair of neat legs as he spoke and caressing one rounded calf with a loving hand. "'Tis a far more genteel weapon. Oh, for the feel of the blades, the pretty talk, as it were, of one with the other! 'Ha, have I got you now, my friend?'—'Ha, would you step between me and my wife? or my mistress? or my pleasure?'—as the case may be. 'Would you? I will teach you, sa—sa!' Now—now one in the ribs! One under that presuming heart! Let the red blood flow, see it drop from the steel: that is something like! Pistols, what of them! pooh! Snap, you blow a pill into the air, and 'tis like enough you have to swallow it yourself! 'Tis for apothecaries, say I, and such as have not been brought up to the noble and gentlemanly art of self-defence."
"Silence, Tom," growled the Colonel; "here is no matter for jesting. This friend of ours has had a mortal affront, has he not? 'Tis established. Shall he not mortally avenge himself upon him who has robbed him of his honour? That is the case, is it not? And, blast me, is not the pistol the deadlier weapon and therefore the most suited? Hey?"
Sir Jasper made an inarticulate sound that might have passed for assent or dissent, or merely as an expression of excessive discomfort of feeling.