"You don't mean it—you can never mean it," says he, stretching out an eager hand towards me. "Dick, do but listen—"
"Mean it, sir!" I repeated, "I tell you it is but the memory of that dead friendship which stays me from calling upon you to account to me with your sword."
"But," he stammered, "you—you would never—you could never—"
"Enough, sir," says I, "I have no desire for further speech with you—save that it would be well at least to keep up an appearance of the old relationship, until this affair is over and done with."
"Why, Dick!" says he, his lips twitching strangely, "why—Dick!" and with the word he turned suddenly and left me.
The duel had been settled for twelve o'clock, and it was exactly half after eleven by my chronometer when a servant came to warn us that the coach was at the door. So we presently descended and got in with never a word betwixt us. When men know each other so thoroughly, there is no need for the mask of gaiety to be held up as is usual at such times; thus we rode very silent and thoughtful for the most part, until we heard Purdy, the surgeon, hailing us from where he stood waiting at the cross roads as had been arranged.
"Well, sirs," says he, nodding and frowning at us in his sharp way as he took his seat, "and how is the foot?"
"Right as a trivet!" says Jack.
"I question that," says Purdy, dogmatically; "that tendon cannot be well for a full month yet—curse me if it can! They tell me," he went on, "that the other side has young Prothero—gentlemen, mark my words!—Prothero's a stark, staring fool—a positive ass!—A man breaks his leg—'Give him a clyster!' says Prothero. A child has teething-rash!—'A clyster! a clyster!' cries Prothero. A boy has the collywobbles or mumps—'A clyster!' says Prothero. Mark me, gentlemen, should Sir John here pink his man, depend upon it Prothero will finish him with a clyster!"
This journey, which I had made a thousand times and more, never seemed so short as it did upon this Christmas morning, yet I for one experienced a feeling akin to relief as we were ushered into the sanded parlour of "The Chequers."