But this night, after first addressing me with looks and tones which began to strike me as unwarrantable, he sat a round of hazard with me, for the sole and determined purpose, as I even then saw, of grossly insulting me. As a reply, I struck him across the face, for, however transparent was the trap laid for me, the provocation before witnesses was of a kind I could not pass over. And, ’fore Heaven, I believe I was in my heart glad of the diversion!
The meeting was fixed for the next morning. Neither of us would consent to delay, and indeed the German’s whole demeanour, once he had given a loose rein to his fury, was more that of a wild beast thirsting for blood than of a being endowed with reason.
Both Sir John Beddoes and Mr. Carew, who had formed our party, indignant at the coarseness of the foreigner’s behaviour, volunteered on the spot to be my seconds, and Carew, who has a subtle knowledge of the etiquette of honour, arranged the details of our meeting. It was to take place in Chelsea Gardens half an hour after sunrise. The weapons chosen by M. de Ville-Rouge were swords, for although the quarrel had been of his own seeking, my blow had given him the right of choice.
It was two o’clock before I found myself again alone in my rooms that night, my friends having conducted me home, and seeming somewhat loath to retire. I was longing for a couple of hours’ solitude before the dawn of the day which might be my last. I felt that my career had reached its turning-point, that this was an event otherwise serious than any of the quarrels in which I had been hitherto embroiled, and that the conduct of affairs was not in my hands.
Carew was anxious about me—he had never yet seen a duellist of my kidney, I believe—and my very quietness puzzled him.
“Make that nutcracker attendant of yours prepare you a hot drink, man,” cried he, as at last, with honest Beddoes, he withdrew, “and get to bed. Nothing will steady your hand like a spell of sleep.”
But there was no sleep for me. Besides that the pain of the slight wound which I had received in the night’s guet-apens was stiffening to great soreness, there was an excitement in my brain—partially due to the fever incident on the hurt—which would not permit the thought of rest.
I had but little business to transact. In view of the present uncertainty of my life, I had recently drawn up a will in which, after certain fitting legacies, I left my great fortune to my wife. Now I merely gathered together the whole of this accumulated narrative of mine into a weighty packet, and after addressing it, deposited it in János’s hands with the strict injunction, in the event of my demise, to deliver it personally to Ottilie.