"I've asked you to keep away from my house, and my sister," returned Harley, "so perhaps I had better explain things to you, as well as I can. Then you can judge for yourself if I'm doing right or not. You'll laugh, I guess—and maybe I'll laugh myself, to-morrow morning. But, first of all, Davy, you must give me your word to keep what I tell you to yourself. Maybe I'll have to tell it to Rayton, if Nell don't object, because of the row I kicked up in his house. That would be only polite, I suppose."
"I'll keep quiet, Jim."
"Let's walk along, to keep warm," said Harley. "It's a long story, Davy, and I guess you'll think it a mighty foolish one."
"Fire away," returned Marsh. "Foolishness is in the air to-night, I reckon."
"Well," began the other slowly, "it starts with my mother's mother. That's kind of a long jump backward, but it can't be helped. It's the way it was told to me. My mother's mother was a pretty fine young woman, I guess, and her parents weren't just the common run—they came from Boston and settled in St. John about the time George Washington got up and hit the other George that smack over the head which we've all read about. Well, the girl grew up a regular beauty, to judge by the way the young fellows carried on about her. Two men led all the others in the running, though. One was a Spaniard, and t'other was an Englishman; and, after a while, it looked as if the Englishman was getting along with the girl better than the Spaniard. The Spaniard called himself a count, or something of that kind.
"One night, at one of those parties the men used to have in those days, after they'd all eaten and drunk about as much as they could hold, they sat down to play cards. I don't know what the game was, but I do know that they used to bet a horse, or a gold watch, or a few acres of land as quick as us fellows will bet five white beans. Well, it happened that the Spanish count and the young Englishman—he was a navy officer, I've heard—and two more were at the same table. Pretty soon the navy officer got a card dealt to him with two red crosses marked on it. I forgot what card it was.
"Well, they didn't make any fuss about it, and went on with the game; but when they were thinking of going home the count got the young fellow by the elbow and whispered something in his ear. The other men didn't hear what it was that he whispered, but every one in the room heard the navy officer's answer—and the lad who afterward married my mother's mother was one of the fellows that heard it. What the Englishman yelled was: 'That's what it means in your country, is it! The devil take you, and your lies, and your damn monkey tricks!' Yes, that's what he yelled, right into the count's yellow face. They drank a terrible lot of liquor in those days. More than was good for them, I reckon."
Jim Harley paused. "It sounds like a crazy sort of yarn to be telling," he said apologetically.
"Go ahead," said David Marsh. "It's a fine yarn, Jim—and your folks must have been pretty big potatoes. It's better than a book. What was it the count whispered to the navy officer?"
"That they never found out," replied Jim. "But the officer told a friend of his—the fellow who got the girl, after all—that the Spaniard was trying to bluff him out of the game—not out of the game of cards, but away from the girl. Anyhow, the count up and let fly a glass of liquor fair into the Englishman's face, just the way it's written in stories. Then there was a rumpus, the Spaniard spitting like a cat, and the other lad trying to smack him in the eye with his fist. But fists weren't considered good enough to fight with, in those days, and it wasn't polite just to pitch in when you felt like it. So they went right out, and off to a field at the edge of the town, and fought a duel with pistols. It was a moonlight night. It looked as if the Spanish count fired half a second too soon—anyhow, he put a hole smash through the Englishman's head. Well, that was too much for the other lads, drunk as most of them were, and they went up to the count and told him that if he wasn't out of the country before sunrise they'd hang him up by the neck like any common murderer. So he went. And he never came back again, as far as I ever heard."