Mitford said nothing, but he was cut to the quick. He had noticed--he could not, even with his blunted feelings and defiant temper, avoid noticing--that men's manners towards him had lately much changed; that acquaintances plunged up by-streets as they saw him coming, or buried themselves in the sheets of newspapers when he entered the club-room; but he had never been directly insulted before. He would revenge himself on Dollamore before he left Baden; meanwhile there was business on hand, and who should he ask to be his second? Mr. Aldermaston, of course; and he sought him at once. Mr. Aldermaston was only too delighted. To be second to a baronet in a duel with a prince, and then to have the story to tell afterwards, particularly if one of them killed the other--he didn't much care which--would set him up for life. Mr. Aldermaston agreed at once, and was put in communication with Prince Tchernigow's friend; and the meeting was arranged for sunrise in the Black Forest, just above the entrance to the Murgthal.
Prince Tchernigow called on Laura late in the afternoon on which these preliminaries were arranged. It is needless to say that he did not hint at them to her; indeed such care had he taken, that Laura had no idea Sir Charles Mitford had met the Prince since their first interview in Baden, though probably Mademoiselle Marcelline might have been better informed. But Tchernigow said on reflection it appeared to him better that she should go to Frankfurt that evening,--it would put a stop to any chance of talk, he said, and he would join her there at the Romischer Kaiser the next morning. Laura agreed, as she would have agreed to anything he might have proposed--so happy was she just then; and while the visitors were engaged at the late table-d'hôte, a carriage drew up at the side-door of the Hôtel de Russie, and Mrs. Hammond and Mademoiselle Marcelline started for Frankfurt.
* * * * *
Lord Dollamore was in the habit of breakfasting late and substantially. The tables were generally laid for the first table-d'hôte before the easy-going Englishman came lounging into the salle-à-manger about ten o'clock, and sat down to his bifteck aux pommes and his half-bottle of Léoville. He was not a minute earlier than usual on the morning after he had refused to act for Mitford, though he felt certain the meeting had taken place. But he thought very little of it; he had seen so many duels amongst foreigners which never came to anything beyond an interchange of pistol-shots, or which were put an end to after the drawing of first blood by a sabre-scratch. It was not until the door was flung open, and Mr. Aldermaston, with his face ashy pale, with his travelling-clothes on and his courier's bag slung round him, rushed into the room, that Lord Dollamore felt that something really serious had happened, and said, "Good God, Aldermaston! what has gone wrong? Speak, man!"
"The worst!" said Aldermaston, whose voice had lost its crisp little society-tone, and who spoke in a hoarse low whisper,--"the worst! Mitford's hit!"
"Killed?"
"No, he's alive still; was at least when I left. We got him into a woodcutter's hut close at hand, and there's a German doctor with him; but, from all I can make out, there's no hope. I must be off over the frontier, or I shall get in a mess myself. Send me a line to the Grand Laboureur at Antwerp, and let me know all, will you? Goodbye."
The scene which he had witnessed seemed to have had the effect of causing Aldermaston to age visibly. His whiskers were lank, his hair dishevelled, the hand which clasped Dollamore's was cold and clammy; and as he hurried from the room it would have been difficult to recognize in him the usual bright chirpy little news-purveyor.
As soon as he was gone Lord Dollamore ordered a carriage to be got ready, and sent round to the Hôtel d'Angleterre to Mr. Keene, the eminent London surgeon, who had arrived two days before, and who, on hearing what had happened, at once consented to accompany Dollamore to where the wounded man was lying. As they proceeded in the carriage, they exchanged very few remarks. Mr. Keene whiled away the time by the perusal of the new number of the Lancet, which had reached him by that morning's post, and which contained some delightfully-interesting descriptions of difficult operations; and Dollamore was immersed in reflections suggested by the nature of the errand on which he was then journeying. He had always had a poor opinion of life in general; and what he had witnessed lately had not tended to raise it. His prophecies regarding Mitford had been more speedily and more entirely fulfilled than he had expected. Mitford had gone to the bad utterly and speedily; and Lady Mitford had had to run the gauntlet in the fullest acceptation of the phrase,--had afforded a topic for the blasting tongues of all the scandal-mongers in London, from no fault of her own, poor child, but from the baseness and brutality of her husband.
These thoughts occupied him till the carriage arrived at a Point beyond which it was impossible for it to proceed further. The man who had driven Mitford and Aldermaston over in the morning, and who had accompanied Dollamore's carriage as guide to the spot, preceded Lord Dollamore and Mr. Keene over rough ruts and among intertwining trees, until at length they reached the hut. Dollamore pushed the door open and looked in, and saw a figure half-dressed, and with the front of its shirt soaked with blood, lying on a heap of straw in one corner of the wretched hovel; a peasant woman standing in the other corner, with two children huddled round her knees; and by the prostrate figure knelt a placid-looking man in black clothes,--a German doctor. He held up his hand in warning, as the door creaked; but Mitford's eyes, turned that way, had fallen on Dollamore, and he tried to beckon him to approach. Dollamore entered, and knelt down beside him. Mitford lips were moving rapidly; but Dollamore could distinguish not a word. The dying man evidently comprehended this. With the last remnant of strength he raised himself until his mouth touched Dollamore's ear, and whispered: