Presently we heard footsteps through the suite of reception-rooms leading to the salon, and the Prince of Favara entered with his uncle the Marchese, and two other Sicilian gentlemen. The Marchese had, it appeared, gone out with him to assist him in finding seconds. They did not seem so astonished as might have been expected at the presence of Donna Rusidda, for they had spoken with her duenna in the chamber leading immediately into ours. But they had the look of men who had come in full of some excitement, suddenly checked by an important piece of news, and greeted the Admiral with marked civility.
It was clearly for him to speak, and he began with his usual courage and directness. “I have come, your Highness, to express my regret that an officer of my fleet should have been guilty of a practical jest upon a lady; but I understand that he has already given you the satisfaction of a gentleman.”
“Your Excellency is mistaken,” said the Prince: “I am not satisfied. I have just arranged with these gentlemen, the Conte di Noto and the Conte di Spaccaforno, to seek his seconds and arrange for the completion of the duel à l’outrance.”
“I understand that he has given you your life, your Highness, which is sufficient satisfaction for any gentleman that I have met in a profession which exists for the purpose of fighting.”
“It may be sufficient by the English code, your Excellency,” said the Prince firmly, but quite courteously; “but according to the code of our country such an insult can only be wiped out by the death of one of the combatants. I shall insist on the meeting being resumed, or brand Signor——”
“Hardres,” said the Admiral.
“——as a coward who insulted a lady and then ran away in the great fleet of England.”
“It seems to me a strange kind of cowardice for a boy of eighteen, just studying the art of fence, to meet a man of thirty, and an accomplished swordsman, and when he has—partly by accident, I will allow—disarmed his adversary, to suffer him to depart untouched, especially when he knows that that adversary had it in his heart to kill him without mercy, and indeed protested that a new duel must be fought.”
But the Prince only replied, “I shall brand him as a coward.”
“I think, your Highness,” said the Admiral, with a wicked look upon his face, such as I think I never saw again in all the years that I had the honour of serving under him, “that you will need all the courage you have to-morrow morning, when the duello is resumed. You will take it up exactly where it ceased. You were lying on your back, I believe, with your sword a dozen yards away in a garlic bed or something of the kind, and Lieutenant Hardres was standing over you, sword in hand. No interference will be tolerated by the guard, which I shall land to see fair play, and the guns of the ships will be trained on Syracuse.”