Full well he knew that before the set of sun nearly every inhabitant of the county of York would hear of the deed; and that a hue-and-cry would be speedily raised by the officers of the law.
It is true that duelling was at this period as much in vogue in genteel circles as it was in England; yet the victor in an affair beyond the water, had no difficulty in slipping away from the scene of his offence, and in passing across the Channel. Here he remained for a decent season; and when he returned, the law in deference to its toleration of the code of honour, shut its eyes. Friends of the vanquished never, or hardly ever, instituted proceedings.
But in the colonies it was different. Godliness had taken a deeper hold in the soil; the Puritans of New England, who, in their zeal, had burned old women because they were guilty of sorcery, had much to say in correcting morals, and removing evil. The duel they considered one of the most odious sins of society; and no doubt it seemed all the more odious to them because it was the sin of an exclusive class who put an estimate upon honour that passed the understanding of men who believed it to be their duty to offer the left cheek after the right had been smitten.
It is only just, however, to say that this was a precept more honoured in the breach than the observance. The long-lipped, witch-burner would draw blood with his knuckles; but he drew the line at the sword. The state of public feeling upon duelling Roland very well knew; and as he thought of Aster, with her sunny hair and glorious, yearning eyes, and the exile that lay before him, a numb feeling of despair began to gather about his heart. He was able to persuade himself that she would look upon the unfortunate affair as necessary for the assertion of his honour; but how could he hope for any further happiness, a criminal in the law's eye, and an exile from the country of Aster?
Why, however, he asked himself, was Aster the central figure in the picture of desolation that he was painting? He had never given her more than a passing thought before; had never thought of her save as a frank, generous, sunny-hearted girl. Now he began to recall words that she had spoken of which he had never before taken heed. The rippling laugh, half like the notes of a silver bell, and half like the trilling of a bob-o-link's song, came back like music now into his desolate soul, making him all the more disconsolate that he was never again to hear it. But had she not looked wistfully into his eyes when he took her hand in the garden to say good-bye? Was such a thought not comforting now? Ah no. Too truly has our poet sung it:
"Comfort! comfort scorned of devils, this is truth the poet sings;—That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things."
Would he, Roland began to ask himself, have been hurried into the hasty words, the passionate feeling, which were really the origin of all this woe, but for his regard for her? No; he saw it all plainly now. He had courted this quarrel; he obtained what he sought, and now did he hold in his hands the bitter fruit.
'But he might have had his will; she is a lone girl; and her unnatural father was no less eager that the marriage should be than the baseborn himself. Let it be!' Then a startled gleam came into his face.
'Ah, the sleuth-hounds are everywhere around,' he cried, as faint and confused shouts came from the road and the country side. 'But I am safe here, at least for a time;' and he looked gratefully at the grand sheltering solitude about him. No footprint desecrated this sanctuary of nature.
He had taken nothing to eat since the evening before; and pangs of hunger began to gnaw him. He walked a short way toward a large, grey rock near which he heard a gurgling sound; and as he advanced he saw that a little stream of water gushed from beneath the base. He drank copiously of the pure, cold spring, and bathed his temples; but in carrying the water to his forehead he noticed that one of his hands was crusted with blood. Then for the first time had the thought of his wound recurred to him.