“I’m not afraid. I don’t mean that. But coming right on top of what you were saying about the Princess, it will set tongues wagging about her.”
“You mean the dog story?” I nodded. “You don’t mean there’s anything in that?”
“There’s one woman who knows it all and by this time has the proofs. The Baroness von Tulken.”
“To the devil with that woman. She’s in everything,” he exclaimed. “Of course that’s where it comes from: and of course she told Albrevics. It’s an ugly story for him to hear. You’ll have to be careful. He means mischief.”
“I’m not thinking about him.”
“No, but he’s been thinking about you, Bergwyn. What will you do?”
“What the devil can I do, man? If it would help things for her, I’d choose pistols and kill him; but it would only make matters worse for her. Everyone will set the quarrel down to her; and that’s just what I’d have given anything to avoid.”
“Oh, it wouldn’t hurt her. It doesn’t hurt a woman here for two men to quarrel about her—choosing, of course, a decent pretext—and for one of ’em to be killed. It’s happened often enough.” His indifferent tone no less than his words astonished me. “Are you a good shot?” he added after a pause.
“I can shoot a bit, and use a sword well enough to keep myself out of danger, probably, if it comes to that.”
“It will come to one or the other, Bergwyn. There’s no other way now. Have you any foils here?” he asked as we reached my house; and when I produced them he proposed that we should try a bout.