“I have no idea, Doctor.”
“The calculation is simple enough,” resumed Dean Pitferge. “If I live sixty years, I shall have been in the world 21,900 days, or 525,600 hours, or 31,536,000 minutes, or lastly, 1,892,160,000 seconds, in round numbers 2,000,000,000 seconds. Now in that time two thousand millions individuals who were in the way of their successors will have died, and when I have become inconvenient, I shall be put out of the way in the same manner, so that the long and short of the matter is to put off becoming inconvenient as long as possible.”
The Doctor continued for some time arguing on this subject, tending to prove to me a very simple theory, the mortality of human creatures. I did not think it worth while to discuss the point with him, so I let him have his say. Whilst we paced backwards and forwards, the Doctor talking, and I listening, I noticed that the carpenters on board were busy repairing the battered stem. If Captain Anderson did not wish to arrive in New York with damages, the carpenters would have to hurry over their work, for the “Great Eastern” was rapidly speeding through the tranquil waters; this I understood from the lively demeanour of the young lovers, who no longer thought of counting the turns of the wheels. The long pistons expanded, and the enormous cylinders heaving on their axle-swings, looked like a great peal of bells clanging together at random. The wheels made eleven revolutions a minute, and the steam-ship went at the rate of thirteen miles an hour.
At noon the officers dispensed with making an observation; they knew their situation by calculation, and land must be signalled before long.
While I was walking on deck after lunch, Captain Corsican came up. I saw, from the thoughtful expression on his face, that he had something to tell me.
“Fabian,” said he, “has received Drake’s seconds. I am to be his second, and he begs me to ask you if you would kindly be present on the occasion. He may rely on you?”
“Yes, Captain; so all hope of deferring or preventing this meeting has vanished?”
“All hope.”
“But tell me, how did the quarrel arise?”
“A discussion about the play was a pretext for it, nothing else. The fact is if Fabian was not aware who Harry Drake was, it is quite evident he knew Fabian, and the name of Fabian is so odious to him that he would gladly slay the man to whom it belongs.”