“This shall not avail you, sir,” cried Fatello, in a tone of indescribable exasperation. “We came to fight, not to play. Fire, sir!” And he stood sideways, expecting his adversary’s bullet.
Steinfeld smiled bitterly. Then, raising his pistol, he took aim at a redbreast, which, scared from the bough by Fatello’s fire, had again settled, tamed by cold and hunger, upon a sapling five-and-twenty paces off. Bark and feathers flew at the same time, and the unlucky little bird lay disembowelled upon the snow. Carcassonne and de Mellay exchanged a word or two, and advanced towards Fatello.
“Enough done, my dear Sigismund,” said the captain. “After the baron’s forbearance, this can go no farther.”
Fatello’s reply was a torrent of imprecations. His eyes were bloodshot, his cheeks pale as death; he was insane with passion. The captain in vain endeavoured to soothe and calm him. He raged and stormed like a madman.
“Monsieur Fatello,” said de Mellay with surprise—almost with disgust—“for heaven’s sake compose yourself. This persistence is unworthy of you. What injury have you received to justify such malignity? Neither your second nor myself can let this affair proceed, otherwise than to a reconciliation.”
There was a decision in the young man’s tone and manner that seemed to strike Fatello and check his fury. For a moment or two he gazed silently at the viscount, as if recalled to reason by his remonstrance. It was the trick of the maniac, to put the keeper off his guard. Suddenly pushing Carcassonne aside, he reached, in two bounds, a pistol-case that lay open at a short distance, and, seizing one of the weapons, levelled it at Steinfeld. With a cry of horror, de Mellay and Carcassonne threw themselves before the baron.
“This is murder!” exclaimed the viscount.
“Stop!” said Steinfeld, pale, but quite calm. “Wait a moment, sir, and you shall be satisfied. There is no alternative, my dear de Mellay. Monsieur Fatello insists. Give me the other pistol.”
De Mellay hesitated, and looked at the captain.
“Ma foi!” said Carcassonne, shrugging his shoulders, as if he thought a bullet more or less hardly worth so much discussion—“if they will have it!” The principals resumed their ground, and the word was again given. This time both pistols were discharged. Steinfeld stirred not, but Fatello fell to the ground and lay there without motion. Dr Pilori ran forward, and, kneeling beside him, unbuttoned his coat. There was a small blue spot on the breast, from which oozed a drop or two of blood. The doctor seized the wrist of the fallen man. Steinfeld and the seconds gazed anxiously in his face, awaiting his verdict.