“You trembled all over; I was afraid you were not well.”
“I 'm never ill,” said he, in the same tone. “There 's a bullet in me somewhere about the hip—they can't make out exactly where—gives me a twinge of pain now and then. Except that, I never knew what ailment means.”
“In what battle?”
“It was n't a battle,” broke he in; “it was a duel. It's an old story now, and not worth remembering. There, you need not shudder, girl; the fellow who shot me is alive, though, I must say, he has n't a very graceful way of walking. Do you ever read the newspapers,—did they allow you ever to read them at school?”
“No; but occasionally I used to catchy a glance at them in the drawing-room. It was a kind of reading fascinated me intensely, it was so real. But why do you ask me?”
“I don't know why I asked the question,” muttered he, half moodily, and hung his head down. “Yes, I do,” cried he, after a pause. “I wanted to know if you ever saw my name—our name—in the public prints.”
“Once,—only once, and very long ago, I did, and I asked the governess if the name were common in England, and she said, 'Yes.' I remember the paragraph that attracted me to this very hour. It was the case of a young man—I forget the name—who shot himself in despair, after some losses at play, and the narrative was headed, 'More of Grog Davis!'”
Davis started back, and, in a voice thick and hoarse with passion, cried out,—
“And then? What next?” The words were uttered in a voice so fearfully wild that Lizzy stood in a sort of stupefied terror, and unable to reply. “Don't you hear me, girl?” cried he. “I asked you what came next.”
“There was an account of an inquest,—some investigation as to how the poor fellow had met his death. I remember little about that. I was only curious to learn who this Grog Davis might be—”