She took my arm obediently and we stepped out by the doorway, bridegroom and bride, in face of the soldiery. A sergeant saluted and came forward for the Commandant's orders.
"A moment, sir," said I, and, laying two fingers on the Commandant's arm, I nodded towards the bole of a stout pine-tree across the clearing. "Will that distance suit you?"
He nodded in reply and as I swung on my heel touched my arm in his turn.
"You will do me the honour, sir, to shake hands?"
"Most willingly, sir." I shook hands with him, casting, as I did so, a glance over my shoulder at the Prince and Father Domenico, who hung back in the doorway—two men afraid. "Come," said I to the Princess, and, as she seemed to hesitate, "Come, my wife," I commanded, and walked to the pine-tree, she following. I held out the handkerchief. She took it, still obediently, and as she took it I clasped her hand and lifted it to my lips.
"Nay," said I, challenging, "what was it you told your brother? A moment? A pang? What are they to weigh against a lifetime of dishonour?"
I saw her blench: yet even while she bandaged me at my bidding, I did not arrive at understanding the folly—the cruel folly of that speech. Nay, even when, having bandaged me, she stepped away and left me, I considered not nor surmised what second meaning might be read in it.
Shall I confess the truth? I was too consciously playing a part and making a handsome exit. After all, had I not some little excuse? . . . Here was I, young, lusty, healthful, with a man's career before me, and across it, trenched at my feet, the grave. A saying of Billy Priske's comes into my mind—a word spoken, years after, upon a poor fisherman of Constantine parish whose widow, as by will directed, spent half his savings on a tombstone of carved granite. "A man," said Billy, "must cut a dash once in his lifetime, though the chance don't come till he's dead." . . . Looking back across these years I can smile at the boy I was and forgive his poor brave flourish. But his speech was thoughtless: the woman (ah! but he knows her better now) was withdrawn with its wound in her heart: and between them Death was stepping forward to make the misunderstanding final.
I remember setting my shoulder-blades firmly against the bole of the tree. A kind of indignation sustained me; a scorn to be cut off thus, a scorn especially for the two cowards by the doorway. They were talking with the Commandant. Their voices sounded across the interval between me and the firing-party. Why were they wasting time? . . .
I could not distinguish their words, save that twice I heard the Prince curse viciously. The hound (I told myself, shutting my teeth) might have restrained his tongue for a few moments.