‘Ready, gentlemen!’ I cried, and desirous of emphasising the signal, lest the Colonel’s keener sight should witness the fall of the handkerchief before the flutter of it caught Wilfrid’s eye, I called out ‘Now!’ and the handkerchief fell to the deck.
There was one report only; it was like the sharp crack of a whip. For the instant I did not know which man’s pistol had exploded, but the little curl of smoke at Wilfrid’s end told me that it was his. I saw the Colonel fling his arms up, and his weapon flashed as he seemed to fire it straight into the air. ‘Good God! how generous!’ was the thought that swept through me; ‘he will not fight.’ He continued holding his pistol elevated whilst you could have counted ten, with a slight backward leaning posture and an indescribable look in his face, absolutely as though he were endeavouring to follow the flight of the bullet; his weapon then fell to the deck, he made a clutch with both hands at his heart, with a deep groan sank—his knees yielding, and, with his hands still at his heart, dropped, as a wooden figure might, on his side and lay without motion.
Finn and I rushed up to him. Whilst the skipper freed his neck I grasped his wrist, but found it pulseless. Yet it was difficult to credit that he was dead. His face was as reposeful as that of a sleeper. There was no look whatever of pain in it—nay, such faint distinguishable expression as I remember had the air of a light smile. I opened his coat, and found a small perforation in the shirt under the right arm; the orifice was as cleanly clipped as though made with a pair of scissors. There was no blood.
‘Dead, sir!’ exclaimed Finn. ‘A noble-looking gentleman, too. A pity, a pity! How gents of this kind stand upon their honour! yet they’re the people to break up homes.’
‘Call Cutbill,’ said I, ‘and let the body be taken below.’
I rose from my knees and walked aft to Wilfrid, who remained standing at the chalked line, his arm that grasped the pistol hanging by his side. There was a kind of lifting look in his face, that with his swelled nostrils and large protruding eyes and a curve of the upper lip, that was made a sarcastic sneer of by the peculiar projection of the under one, indicated a mood of scornful triumph, of exultation subdued by contempt.
‘You have killed your man, Wilfrid,’ said I.
‘I have shot him through the heart,’ said he, talking like one newly aroused from his slumber and still in process of collecting his mind.
‘Most probably. You hit him in some vital part, anyway. He dropped dead.’