Colden was not a man of much originality. So, 246 in his instinctive endeavor to gain time, he bungled out the conventional reply, “You wish to seek a quarrel with me, sir?”
“Seek a quarrel?” retorted Peyton. “Is not the quarrel here? Has not Miss Philipse spoken of an offence to your name, for which I ought to receive payment from you? Gad, she’d not have to speak twice to make me draw!”
Colden continued to be as conventional as a virtuous hero of a novel. “I do not fight in the presence of ladies, sir,” said he.
“Nor I,” said Peyton. “Choose your own place, in the garden yonder. With snow on the ground, there’s light enough.”
And Harry went quickly, almost to the door, near which he stopped to give Colden precedence.
“Nay,” put in Elizabeth, “we ladies can bear the sight of a sword-cut or two. Wait for us,” and she would have gone to send for wraps, but that Colden raised his hand in token of refusal, saying:
“Nay, Elizabeth. I will not consent.”
“Come, sir,” said Peyton. “’Tis no use to oppose a lady’s whim. But if you make haste, we may have it over before they can arrive on the ground.”
In handling his sword-hilt, Peyton had pulled the weapon a few inches out of the scabbard, and now, though he did not intend to draw while in the house, 247 he unconsciously brought out the full length of what remained of the blade. For the time he had forgotten the sword was broken, and now he was reminded of it with some inward irritation.
Meanwhile Colden was answering: