"Fight."
"Never!"
"I don't see how you can get out of it."
"I'll run away."
In a moment Frank became very grave.
"That is impossible, professor," he said, with the utmost apparent sincerity. "Think of the disgrace! It would be in all the papers that Professor Scotch, a white-livered Northerner, after insulting Colonel La Salle Vallier and presenting his card, had taken to his heels in the most cowardly fashion, and had fled from the city without giving the colonel the satisfaction that is due from one gentleman to another. The Northern papers would copy, and you would find yourself the butt of ridicule wherever you went."
The professor let out a groan that was more dismal and doleful than any sound that had previously issued from his lips.
"What can I do?" he gasped.
"There is one way to get out of the difficulty."
"Name it! name it!" shouted the wretched man. "I'll do anything!"