"It would have been good for us all if it had ended like a college trick. When I told you that we had prepared a trick you approved of it, Angela; you know you did. None of us thought for a moment that it would end as it has done. Behrend was sitting at the chess-table; Salista was opposite to him, leaning against the chimney-piece. After Salista had said the words, 'I know that a certain pair of eyes keeps Countess Angela in Pesth,' and before I had time to make the answer agreed upon, Ivan threw down the gauntlet. 'That is a lie!' he said."
"Ah!" cried Angela, while an electric thrill ran through her veins.
"We all sprang to our feet; the joke had ended badly. Salista grew pale; he had not counted upon this. 'Sir,' he said to Behrend, 'take back that word of yours; it is a word that in my life no man has said to me.'"
"And Behrend?" asked Angela, seizing Edmund's hand.
"Behrend stood up from the table, and answered quietly, in a cold voice, 'It is possible that up to the present you have given no occasion for this reproach to be cast in your face; but to-night I repeat that you have lied.' Then he left the room. I ran after him to try and smooth down matters. I met him in the hall. He turned to me and said, quietly, 'My dear friend, you know what must now happen. I beg that you will ask Count Geza in my name, and that you and he will be my seconds. You will communicate to me what has been settled; all is in your hands.' In this way he invited me to play the part which I had destined for him. Now he is the duellist, and I am the second. I tried to drive him into a corner. I represented to him that it was not his right to throw down the gauntlet for the Countess Angela. He answered, 'It is the right and the duty of every gentleman to protect the lady whose guest he is.' This answer, from a chivalrous point of view, is perfectly correct, but it sounds strangely from the lips of the man who a couple of hours ago told us there was no one in the world for whose good name he would fight a duel."
Angela sank back in her chair. "Oh, what terrible folly it has all been!" she wailed. "No, no, this duel cannot be! I shall prevent it!"
"I wish you would tell me what means you intend to take to prevent it."
"I will at once speak with Ivan Behrend—this moment; do you hear?"
"Unfortunately, that is impossible. When he left me he gave the order to put his horses to. There, you hear those wheels? That is his carriage. Geza has gone with him, and we four are to follow him presently. One cannot arrange this sort of thing in a strange house; that is done only on the stage. The principals must wait in their own houses to hear what we have decided to do."
"But, my God! I will not let it be done; do you hear? I will speak to Uncle Stefan."