"Let me alone," cried the infuriated Frenchman. "He has struck me, and I will have his heart's blood. Sacre nomme de Dieu!" screamed he, forgetting his usual polished manner along with his English, and leaping about like a madman. "Donnez moi son gage!"
"Not now, I tell you, not now. Come along and I will satisfy you in ten minutes that you cannot fight that coward," emphasizing the last word, so that Medwin could not fail to hear.
"Mr. Allington," said Medwin, coming forward into the middle of the group, now reduced to some dozen persons—for an altercation is not of such rarity as to create any particular excitement there—"after the base and dishonorable use you have this day permitted to be made of a private letter, I am sincerely glad that circumstances rendered it impossible for me to treat you as a gentleman; but as to this person, (pointing to St. Maur,) I can easily satisfy him that he will run no risk of losing his reputation by honoring me with his notice. I have the honor to refer Monsieur St. Maur to Mr. ——, now at the St. Charles, whose character for honor is too well known throughout the country to be disputed." And, bowing low, Medwin left the room.
"Well, now this is a pretty scrape," said St. Maur, subsiding at once; "and I don't see how I can avoid fighting him. He is not such a cockroach!" and the Frenchman turned a little pale, despite his yellow skin.
"Nonsense," replied Allington, "you shall do no such thing. In the first place, I can't spare you; and in the next, if we can irretrievably disgrace Medwin, so that he may be shunned by everybody, I do not think the weak head of my Clara can withstand the storm; and she will gradually learn to despise him, too. So take no further notice of this matter; for a blow from a published coward carries no more disgrace with it than a bite from a dog, or a kick from an ass. You must help me out with my plans, too, in behalf of my charming heiress, and I'll be sure to remember you in my will. Let's take a julep."
For three days Medwin waited in an agony of impatience to hear from St. Maur, but not a word came—and he began to despair. Everywhere he went he was regarded with significant glances, and pointed at, while a disdainful whisper ran round the room, in which he could always distinguish the words, "white-livered Yankee," "coward," or some equally obnoxious epithet. He saw the cruel game that was playing against him. He had forgotten that, in refusing to fight with Allington, he had rendered it perfectly safe for every whipster in the community to insult him; and he now became suddenly aware that he had involved himself in a dilemma from which it was impossible for him to escape.
In the midst of these reflections—while life had become intolerable, and infamy and disgrace dogged his steps like a shadow—he never entertained a doubt of Clara's love and constancy, and looked forward to the time when he might claim her as his bride, and, amid the milder and manlier associations of his youth, regain that calmness and self-respect which he had here so strangely lost. His position was, in truth, a most wretched one. Opposed to the barbarous practice of dueling, circumstances and his own loss of self-control had forced him to accept a challenge, and then recall that acceptance, and to offer an insult to a stranger, for the express purpose of drawing out another.
Upon the day after his refusal to fight with Allington, he had called at Mr. Harland's, but was told that Clara had been taken suddenly ill, and could not be seen. This was a new and deeper anxiety, added to his already overburdened spirit; and he really had begun to be deserted of hope, and to contemplate a speedy relief from the pains of existence. Nothing but the confidence which he reposed upon Clara's love, rendered the bright sunshine an endurable blessing to the sadly distempered youth. But he could not see her. Day after day he called, and always the same cold, formal reply—"Miss Harland was yet very ill, but in no danger, and could not be spoken with." Could he but see her for an instant—could he touch her hand, or meet her smile, or drink in the sweet music of her voice, he would feel his heart nerved against every disaster, and would wait in patience; but all, all alone, amid lowering brows, or sneering faces, which ever glowered like phantoms about him—whether in reality, as he walked the streets, or in dreams, as he tossed upon his pillow—it was too much. His heart seemed to be on fire.
It was in this frame of mind, with reason tortured to her utmost power of endurance, and insanity peeping into that soul which might so soon become her own, that Medwin, while walking up the Shell-Road, and looking wistfully at the muddy canal, which swam away sluggishly on one hand, while the green and stagnant swamp stretched interminably upon the other, that he was startled by the rapid approach of a carriage, and the sound of gay and noisy mirth. He looked up. The brilliant equipage of Mrs. Harland was hurrying by, and he had barely time to distinguish Clara, looking as fresh and blooming as a newly flowered rose, and laughing and chatting in a lively and even boisterous manner with—Mr. Allington!
She leaned over the carriage-side as they whirled along, and, for an instant, her eyes met those of her bewildered lover.