"All right," he said, when he had finished. "I accept the challenge, and I am ready to fulfil it when it suits you. But it is rather odd," he added with a nervous laugh, which badly cloaked the anger which consumed him. "It is rather odd for the señor duke to send the challenge, seeing that I am the injured party. This course seems to me more prompted by fear than by gentlemanliness."
"Señor de las Cuevas," broke in the ex-colonel with acerbity, "we can not permit these derogatory remarks to be made in our presence."
Gonzalo looked at him in an absent way as if he had not heard him, and then continued:
"In fact I could, and even I ought to reject his challenge, because it is not customary for decent men to fight scoundrels, even if they bear the title of king."
"Señor de las Cuevas," exclaimed Golarza, rising in anger from his seat, "this is insufferable, and I will not permit you to speak like this."
"The Duke of Tornos is a scoundrel, and you know he is," he returned, looking him straight in the eyes in a provocative way.
The fact was, it would have required some courage to withstand Gonzalo at that moment. Golarza turned white and, rising, said:
"This is your house, therefore I retire."
"Do you want me to say it to you outside?" he exclaimed impetuously as he also rose from his seat.
"Señores," cried the marquis in his cracked voice, "calm yourselves. Golarza, you have no right to get angry. The sort of injury that our patron has done the gentleman (and I am sorry to have to refer to it) excuses his want of appreciation of his character. I think from the moment he accepts the duel he has sufficiently atoned for the tone of his remarks, the outcome of the natural anger to which he is a prey."