When they were outside, he said: "Now you must go to your room. I will follow you in a few minutes. Of course you are the challenger?"
"Yes."
"Then I shall challenge Felix Grenwitz in your name. You choose pistols."
"Yes. You will please challenge him, and whoever else may desire to meet me."
"We will content ourselves for the present with Grenwitz. You do not care for the others half as much, I suppose. When?"
"As soon as possible. To-morrow morning, as far as I am concerned."
"Bon, Ten paces distance!"
"Or five."
"Ten is enough. Leave the rest to me. Au revoir, then, in your room."
The baron returned to the card-room, where the last scene had taken place. Twenty tongues at once were discussing the matter, but they all became silent when he entered. Oldenburg delivered his message to Grieben, who had undertaken to act as Felix's second. They agreed upon a meeting at five o'clock on the next morning, or at ten, if Felix should not have sufficiently recovered before, and the place was to be a small copse on Baron Cloten's estate. Then the gentlemen returned--it may be imagined in what state of mind to the ball-room, where the ladies had been waiting for some time, to escort them to the supper-rooms. Felix had been carried off by his friends to his rooms; he was too drunk and too much stunned by his fall to appear again in the company. Oldenburg returned to Oswald.