"Oh, Scarlett!" said Lord Newhaven, detaining him languidly, "I want three minutes of your valuable time. Come into my study."
"Another cross-bow for Westhope Abbey?" said Hugh, trying to speak unconcernedly, as he followed his host to a back room on the ground floor. Lord Newhaven was collecting arms for the hall of his country-house.
"No; much simpler than those elaborate machines," said the older man, turning on the electric light. Hugh went in, and Lord Newhaven closed the door.
Over the mantel-shelf were hung a few old Japanese inlaid carbines, and beneath them an array of pistols.
"Useless now," said Lord Newhaven, touching them affectionately. "But," he added, with a shade more listlessness than before, "Society has become accustomed to do without them, and does ill without them, but we must conform to her." Hugh started slightly, and then remained motionless. "You observe these two paper lighters, Scarlett? One is an inch shorter than the other. They have been waiting on the mantel-shelf for the last month, till I had an opportunity of drawing your attention to them. I am sure we perfectly understand each other. No name need be mentioned. All scandal is avoided. I feel confident you will not hesitate to make me the only reparation one man can make another in the somewhat hackneyed circumstances in which we find ourselves."
Lord Newhaven took the lighters out of the glass. He glanced suddenly at Hugh's stunned face and went on:
"I am sorry the idea is not my own. I read it in a magazine. Though comparatively modern, it promises soon to become as customary as the much-to-be-regretted pistols for two and coffee for four. I hold the lighters thus, and you draw. Whoever draws or keeps the short one is pledged to leave this world within four months, or shall we say five, on account of the pheasant shooting? Five be it. Is it agreed? Just so! Will you draw?"
A swift spasm passed over Hugh's face, and a tiger glint leaped into Lord Newhaven's eyes, fixed intently upon him.
There was a brief second in which Hugh's mind wavered, as the flame of a candle wavers in a sudden draught. Lord Newhaven's eyes glittered. He advanced the lighters an inch nearer.
If he had not advanced them that inch Hugh thought afterwards that he would have refused to draw.