"I do not fight."
"After that, man! Not—after——" He did not finish the sentence, but laughed with uplifted chin, as at some great joke.
"No," Colonel John said between his teeth.
And then no one spoke. A something in Colonel John's tone and manner, a something in the repression of his voice, sobered the spectators, and turned that which might have seemed an ignominy, a surrender, into a tragedy. And a tragedy in which they all had their share. For the insult had been so wanton, so gross, so brutal, that there was not one of the witnesses who had not felt shame, not one whose sympathy had not been for a moment with the victim, and who did not experience a pang on his account as he stood, mild and passive, before them.
Payton alone was moved only by contempt. "Lord above us, man!" he cried, finding his voice again. Are you a Quaker? If so, why the devil do you call yourself a soldier?"
"I am no Quaker," Colonel John answered, "but I do not fight duels."
"Why?"
"If I killed you," the Colonel replied, eyeing him steadily, "would it dry my neckcloth or clean my face?"
"No!" Payton retorted with a sneer, "but it would clean your honour!" He had felt the reprehension in the air, he had been conscious for a few seconds that he had not the room with him; but the perception made him only the more arrogant now that he felt his feet again. "It would prove, man, that, unlike the beasts that perish, you valued something more than your life!"
"I do."