“May I ask, Mr. Overton, if you prefer the window down or up?” asked Giles, with great deference.
“Either, dear sir,” responded Overton. “I believe it was up when you kindly invited us to enter.”
“True; but you may be sensitive to the air, and may catch cold.”
At which Mr. Buxton grinned in a heartless manner. The window remained up.
We were much crowded with the two pistol-cases and the surgeon’s box of instruments, which to me appeared more appalling than the pistols.
At last we reached the spot,—a small, flat place under a sweetly-blooming hawthorn hedge, with some verdant oaks at either end.
Giles and Overton were so scrupulous about taking precedence of each other in getting out of the chaise, that I had strong hopes the day would pass before they came to a decision; but Mr. Buxton finally got out himself and pulled his man after him, and then we were soon marking off the ground, and I was feeling that mortal sickness which had attacked me the first time I was under fire in the Ajax.
Overton won the toss for position, and at that I could have lain down and wept.
Our men were placed twenty paces apart, with their backs to each other. At the word “one,” they were to turn, advance and fire between the words “two” and “three.” This seemed to me the most murderous arrangement I had ever heard of.
The stories I had so lately heard about Overton’s proficiency with the pistol made me think, even if he did not kill Giles intentionally, he would attempt some expert trick with the pistol, which would do the business equally well. I knew Giles to be a very poor shot, and concluded that he, through awkwardness, would probably put an end to Overton, and I regarded them both as doomed men.