If Telfer made up his mind to shoot off your fifth waistcoat-button, your fifth waistcoat-button would be irrevocably doomed; and therefore, having determined to himself to lodge a bullet in this young puppy's left wrist, in the left wrist did the ball lodge. Snobley was "satisfied," very amply satisfied, I fancy, by his looks. He'd fired, and sent his shot right into the trunk of a chestnut growing some seven yards off his opponent, to Heavyside's supreme scorn.
"That'll teach him not to talk of young ladies in his Mabille slang," said Telfer, lighting his cigar. "I hope the little snob may be the better for my lesson. Now I am en route, I'll go over to Pipesandbeersbad, breakfast at the Hôtel de France, and go and see Humbugandschwerinn: he wants me to look at some English racers Brookes has just sent him over. Make my excuses at Essellau; and I say, Vane, see if you can't get us away in a day or two; have some call home, or something, for I shall never stand this long."
With which not over-clear speech the Major mounted his horse and cantered off towards the Bad.
I rode back; went to my own room, had some chocolate, read Pigault le Brun, and about noon, seeing Virginie, the Tressillian, and several others out on the terrace, went to join them. Marc slipped his arm through mine and drew me aside.
"I say, Vane, what's all this about Telfer striking some fellow for talking about the Tressillian? Staurmgaurn was over here just now, and told me there was a row in the card-room at Humbugandschwerinn's between Telfer and another Englishman. I knew nothing about it. Is it true?"
"So far true," I answered, "that Telfer put a ball in the youth's wrist at seven o'clock this morning; and serve him right too—he's an impudent young snob."
"By Jove!" cried Marc, "what in the world made him take the Tressillian's part? Have the beaux yeux really made an impression on the most unimpressionable of men?"
"The devil they have," said I, crossly; "but I wish she'd been at the deuce first, for he's too good a fellow to waste his best years pining after a pair of dark eyes."
Marc shrugged his shoulders. "C'est vrai; but we're all fools some time or other. The idea of Telfer's chivalry! I declare it's quite like the old days of Froissart and Commines—fighting for my lady's favor." And away he went, singing those two famous lines from Alcyonée:
Pour mériter son cœur, pour plaire à ses beaux yeux,
J'ai fait la guerre aux rois: je l'aurais faite aux dieux;