"I will."
Soberly Gideon North looked me in the eye. Already Gleazen, Matterson, Arnold, and the others were moving toward the companionway. This happened, you must remember, in '27; dueling was not regarded then as it is now.
"I am afraid, my boy, it will not be a fair fight."
"It will be fair enough," I replied.
Rising, Captain North brought out his medicine chest.
I followed the others on deck, as if the little world in which I was moving were a world of unreality. All that I knew of swordsmanship, I had learned from Cornelius Gleazen himself; and though I felt that at the end of our lessons I had learned enough to give him a hard fight, it was quite another matter to cross swords that carried no buttons, and to believe that one of us was to die.
There was only starlight on deck, and Captain North stepped briskly forward to Arnold and Matterson, who were standing together by a clear space that they had paced off.
"Gentlemen," said he, "if they were to wait until morning—"
"There would be more light, to be sure," Arnold returned, "but the disadvantage is common to both."