“There’s no risk,” said Schmit, with a laugh. “I am certain that I shall kill him.”
“How can you be certain?”
“I shall make him tremble.”
He was right. This secret is infallible when it is applied to a coward. We found d’Ache and de Pyene on the field, and five or six others who must have been present from motives of curiosity.
D’Ache took twenty louis from his pocket and gave them to his enemy, saying,
“I may be mistaken, but I hope to make you pay dearly for your brutality.” Then turning to me he said,
“I owe you twenty louis also;” but I made no reply.
Schmit put the money in his purse with the calmest air imaginable, and making no reply to the other’s boast placed himself between two trees, distant about four paces from one another, and drawing two pistols from his pocket said to d’Ache,
“Place yourself at a distance of ten paces, and fire first. I shall walk to and fro between these two trees, and you may walk as far if you like to do so when my turn comes to fire.”
Nothing could be clearer or more calmly delivered than this explanation.