The Master of the Ceremonies

“But he’s only a fiddler.”

“Enough of the gentleman for my purpose, I tell you,” roared Rockley fiercely. “I’ll kill him.”

“Nonsense, man alive. If you must meet, wing him, or pink him, or spoil the blackguard’s good looks. You can’t kill a man!”

“Can’t kill a man!” said the Major, in a low hissing voice; “can’t kill a man!”

“I say, Rockley! Hang it all, don’t look the diabolical like that: you give me the cold shivers. Why, I wouldn’t be called out by you on any consideration.”

“Ha-ha-ha!” laughed Rockley, with a ghastly attempt at mirth. “Did I look queer?”

“Queer? You looked queer multiplied ten thousand times. Why, Rockley, one of you with a face like that would scare a regiment of French cuirassiers. I say, what was the row about – a woman?”

“Curse her!” cried Rockley, flashing out into uncontrolled rage again, as he writhed with mental and bodily pain. “I’ll bring her to her senses for this. Treat me as if I were some gawky boy, to be held off and coaxed on, and then bidden to keep my distance!”

“What girl was it?”

“Curse you! don’t ask questions.”

“Bah! What a fire-eater you are, Rockley. As if I did not know. So the fairy Clairy has been saying, ‘How dare you, sir?’ Ha – ha – ha!”

“Do you want to quarrel, man?” said the Major, with an angry look in his eye.

“Not I, old lad; not with you in that temper. So she has been riding the high horse, and bidding you keep your distance; and, just in the nick of time, she had her dear friend Dick Linnell there, and the strong-armed fool horsewhipped you.”

Rockley turned upon him savagely, and gripped him by the arm so fiercely that Sir Harry Payne involuntarily shrank away.

“Don’t!” cried the Major hoarsely. “Don’t! or I can’t answer for myself.”

“Why, Rockley!”

“Don’t speak to me. Man, I feel as if that Linnell had roused a devil in me, and till I see him on the turf helpless I shall know no rest. Were you ever beaten – cut – and wealed with your own whip?”

“Well, egad, not to put too fine a point on it, old lad, it was not with a whip; it was a walking cane.”

“And did it cut deep down into your very soul, and make you feel as if nothing but blood would heal the pain?”

“Well, egad, no. It hurt a good deal, but I was obliged to pocket it all. Lady’s husband was a bit put out, you see. But that’s a long time ago. And do you really mean to fight?”

“Fight? If I don’t I shall lie in wait for the scoundrel and shoot him like a dog.”

“You couldn’t do that, my dear Rockley. Behaviour unworthy of an officer and a gentleman.”

“And as for that woman,” continued Rockley, striding up and down the room as if he were some savage beast confined in a cage, “my God! she shall smart for this!”

“My dear Rockley,” said Sir Harry, “you went the wrong way to work.”

“Silence, idiot!” roared the Major fiercely. “You would, of course, have won. She would have gone down on her knees to you. You are so handsome – so irresistible. Oh, damn it! No one could withstand you!”

“Sneer away, old fellow. I’m not going to boast,” said Sir Harry with a quiet, self-satisfied smile. “I’m not the man to kiss and tell; but – never mind.”

“Go on and settle that at once. No shirking; no excuses, mind. He shall meet me, and then – ”

“Then – poor devil!” murmured Sir Harry Payne, as he sauntered out of the room and away across the parade ground. “What a temper he has! By George! if he were little May’s husband I’m afraid I should be disposed to abdicate in favour of some one, who might flirt to his heart’s content for me.

“Now what’s to be done? Shall I tell the Colonel? No. Wouldn’t do. The matter must go on. He’ll be cooler when they meet, and it will only mean a wing or a leg. That’s all.”

He went jauntily down to the parade, and exchanged pinches of snuff with old Lord Carboro’, who looked after him and muttered, “Fashionable fool! I wonder how much he owes Barclay. I must see. Clode tells me things are going too far, and I’m not going to have some one’s fair fame smirched through that idiot. A few months in a debtor’s prison would do him good.”

In happy ignorance of the remarks made behind his back, Sir Harry Payne went on to the house on the Parade, and Lord Carboro’ trotted off, snuff-box in hand, slightly uneasy in mind, but at rest compared to what he would have been had he known of the encounter that had taken place, and of Sir Harry Payne’s mission.

Richard Linnell had not returned, so Sir Harry bethought himself of Colonel Mellersh, found him at home, began chatting with him concerning cards, and the company staying in the place, firmly resolved not to give the Colonel a hint about his mission – and in ten minutes he had told him all.

“Tut – tut – tut!” ejaculated the Colonel. “I’m very sorry. About Claire Denville, you say?”

“Egad, Mellersh, what a fellow you are! You pump a man dry. Well, yes. Rockley’s dead on her. You remember the serenade?”

“Ah, yes; that horrible night!”

“Well, he’s a close fellow, as a rule, about his amours, but he raves about that girl.”

“Had she gone to meet him?”

“I don’t know; suppose so. Then the other lover comes; and it’s tom-cats.”

“They came to blows!”

“Blows?” said Sir Harry, bending forward and taking the Colonel by a button: “as far as I can make out, Linnell took his riding-whip from him, and he is lashed from head to foot.”

“And all about that girl of Denville’s,” said the Colonel, with a contemptuous look.

“Yes. But, my dear boy, you must own that she is devilishly handsome.”

“Oh yes, she’s handsome enough. Then the affair is serious?”

“Serious?” said Sir Harry, lowering his voice. “Rockley swears he’ll kill him.”

Colonel Mellersh looked very grave.

“They’ll have to meet, then?”

“Meet, my dear sir! Rockley says he’ll lie in wait for him and shoot him like a dog if he doesn’t come out. Fancy, you know, beaten like that before a lady!”

“And such a lady as Claire Denville,” said Colonel Mellersh, with a sneer. “Well,” he added, changing his manner, “I’m very sorry.”

“Yes, so am I. Rockley’s deuced haughty, and bullying, and overbearing, particularly lately – things seem to have gone wrong with him – but he’s not a bad fellow.”

“As men go,” said the Colonel with a sneer.

“Exactly – as men go,” replied Sir Harry, whose brains were not very analytical as regarded double entendre.

Just then Richard Linnell reached the door, encountered Cora Dean, and was finally beckoned into Colonel Mellersh’s room.

“My dear Linnell,” said the Colonel gravely, as the others exchanged distant bows, “Sir Harry Payne has called on behalf of Major Rockley – as his friend.”

He watched Linnell’s face intently, but there was only a slight contraction of the brows.

“Bravo!” said the Colonel to himself. “He’s staunch.”

“Mellersh,” said Linnell gravely, “I have no friend to whom I can appeal but you in a case like this.”

“I would far rather leave it,” said Colonel Mellersh slowly; “but perhaps if you leave the affair in my hands, Sir Harry Payne and I may be able to arrange for a peaceful issue. Major Rockley may be ready to withdraw or apologise.”

“S’death, sir!” cried Sir Harry; “apologise for being horsewhipped!”

“I beg pardon,” said the Colonel. “You see, I am not properly acquainted with the matter.”

“There can be no apology, Colonel Mellersh,” said Linnell, with a grave dignity that made the Colonel’s eyes light up. “I leave myself in your hands, and I shall be most grateful.”

“But – ”

“I need say no more,” said the young man. “Of course, I know what Sir Harry Payne’s visit means, and I am ready when and where you will.”

He bowed and left the room with all the formality of the time; and when, about a quarter of an hour later, Sir Harry Payne went away, the young officer uttered a contemptuous sneer.

“’Pon my soul,” he muttered, “it is horribly degrading for Rockley. The fellow really is no better than a fiddler after all.”

Volume Two – Chapter Four.

A Lesson in Pistol Practice

The reason for Sir Harry Payne’s sneering remark was patent to Colonel Mellersh as soon as he opened the door, for from the Linnells’ rooms came the sweet harmonies of a couple of exquisitely-played violins, and for a few minutes the Colonel seemed to forget the trouble on hand, as he stood with his face softened, and one delicate hand waving to the rhythm of the old Italian music.

“Poor lad!” he said, as his face changed, and a look of pain crossed his brow. “And for her, too. Weak, foolish lad! He’s infatuated – as we all are at some time or other in our lives.”

He stood in his doorway, thoughtful, and with brow knit.

“That chattering pie will spread it all over the town. Clode will get to know, and then – well, we must take care.”

He crossed the hall, tapped lightly on the opposite door, and then entered.

“Bravo – bravo!” he cried, clapping his delicate white hands. “Admirable!”

“Ah, Mellersh, come and join us,” said the elder Linnell, raising his glasses on to his forehead. “Just in time for a trio.”

“No, no, not to-day. Impossible. My head is terrible this morning. Late hours – cards – strong coffee. I came to ask Dick here if he would be my companion for a six-mile walk to Shankley Wood.”

The elder Linnell looked from one to the other with a smile.

“Oh, I’m sure he will,” he said. “Eh, Dick?”

“Of course, father, of course.”

“And out all the morning, too! Well, well, fresh air for health.”

“Why don’t you get more then, Linnell?”

“I – I?” said the grave, elderly man slowly. “I don’t know. I don’t want fresh air. I’m very well as I am. I shall do for my time here.”

“Why, father,” said Richard merrily, as he clapped him on the shoulder, “what a tone to take.”

He exchanged a quick, agonised glance with Mellersh, and then proceeded to replace his violin and bow in the case.

“Come to me, Dick,” said the Colonel; “I want to go to my room:” and he went out, busied himself for a few minutes in his bedroom, and then came out again into the hall, to find Mrs Dean disappearing up the staircase, and Cora giving some orders to her little groom.

He waited till she turned and came towards him with a scornful look in her eyes.

“Well,” he said, in a low voice, and with a longing undertook in his eyes that he evidently tried to conceal, “how many poor fellows slain this morning?”

“How many are there here worth slaying?” she said, in the same low tone.

“A matter of taste,” he said, gravely. “A matter of taste, Miss Cora Dean.”

“Not one,” she said, giving him her hand in response to his own held out.

“I don’t know,” he said, looking very keenly in her eyes, “anger – love – jealousy.”

She snatched her hand away.

“Don’t fool!” she cried angrily. “I? Jealous?”

“Yes, you – jealous,” he said; and then as she hurried up the stairs, “and there would be another emotion to trouble you, Cora Dean, if you knew all that I know now. Ah, Dick! Ready?”

“Yes. Who was that, here?”

“Your fair enslaver – Cora Dean!”

Richard looked up at him keenly and laughed as they left the house, ignorant of the fact that Cora was watching them intently, and Mrs Dean was keeping up a running fire of comment on what she called her “gal’s foolery.”

Mellersh led the way at a good brisk pace along the parade, and they had not gone far before they became aware of the tall figure of the Master of the Ceremonies showing himself, as was his wont, king of the place apparently, and bowing and acknowledging bows.

Richard Linnell drew his breath with a slight hiss, but there was no avoiding the encounter, and as they drew near and raised their hats, there was a smile and most courteous bow for Colonel Mellersh, and the most distant of salutes for his companion.

“Old impostor,” said the Colonel, as they took the first turning and made for the country beyond the Downs.

“No,” said Richard Linnell gravely, “I don’t think him that. He is a gentleman at heart, fond of his children, and his ways are forced upon him by his position.”

“Fond of his children! Bah! As objects of merchandise. I tell you, Dick, I hate the man.”

“And when you hate a man you are unjust.”

“Not here. My dear Dick, you look at old Denville through rose-coloured glasses. Pah! I detest him, and, by Jove, sir, I don’t acquit him of some knowledge of that terrible affair at his house.”

“Colonel Mellersh!”

“My dear boy!”

They walked on in silence for a few minutes, and then, clear now of the town, Colonel Mellersh exclaimed:

“My dear Dick, you have always known my feelings regarding this unfortunate attachment.”

“Yes,” said the young man sadly.

“She is very beautiful, but see how she has been brought up. Look at her sister – a weak, vain, foolish child more than a married woman, about whom there is bound to be some scandal soon.”

“Can the sister help that?”

“Look at the brother; that careless young ne’er-do-weel, who is to be trained up in his father’s steps.”

“Poverty seems to be their greatest sin,” replied Richard quietly.

“Then, there is another son, who quarrelled with the father and went off and enlisted. My dear Dick, is such a family one that you ought to enter?”

“My dear Colonel,” said Richard with a sad smile, “I do not seem likely to enter it. You saw the look old Denville gave me. But, for heaven’s sake, don’t throw out hints again about that murder.”

“Very well, but you must promise me that there shall be an end to all this infatuation. I speak as your father’s oldest and dearest friend, and as one who feels as if he had a share in you – you reckless wild young scapegrace.”

“I can promise nothing,” said Richard coldly.

“Not now that you have been dragged into this serious affair?”

“Miss Denville has dragged me into no serious affair. Her conduct to me has always been that of a refined and modest lady.”

“My dear boy! Have you forgotten that this has been going on between her and Rockley for months?”

“There is nothing between Major Rockley and Miss Denville,” said Richard hoarsely; and his cheeks began to burn and his eyes to flash.

“Dick! Have you forgotten the serenade that night?”

“Have I forgotten it!” cried Richard fiercely.

“Well, what does that show?”

“That this scoundrel – this roué– this libertine – dared to cast his vile eyes on as sweet and pure a girl as ever breathed. Look here, Colonel Mellersh – no, no – my dear old friend – I found that dog insulting Miss Denville.”

“Where?”

“Away there, beyond the Downs, out past the fishermen’s cottages.”

“How came Claire Denville out there alone with one of the wildest officers at the barracks?”

“Heaven knows,” cried Richard. “I tell you I found him grossly insulting her, and I took the dog’s whip from him, and thrashed him till my arm ached.”

“And the lady flung herself into your arms, called you her gallant, her brave preserver, and you embraced and swore fidelity, while the wicked villain, the dog that you had thrashed, sneaked off snarling, with his tail between his legs.”

Richard turned upon him fiercely, but he checked his anger as he met the Colonel’s mocking eyes.

“You do not know Claire Denville,” he said coldly.

“But, Dick, lad, come – there was the embracing and thanks?”

“Miss Denville is a sweet, true lady,” said Richard, “whom I fear I may never win.”

“Never win!” said the Colonel mockingly. “Dick, Dick, what a child you are! I used, a year or two back, to be glad you were so different to the other men here; but now I almost regret that you have not led a faster life. You are such an innocent boy.”

“Shall we turn back?” said Richard abruptly.

“Turn back, man, no. We have not said a word yet about your meeting. Don’t be angry with me, lad. Believe me, I am one of your truest friends.”

“I know it,” cried Richard warmly; “but don’t talk of my love affair. We shall never agree till the scales of prejudice have dropped from your eyes.”

“Till the scales of a boyish folly have dropped from yours, Dick. Well, we shall be in accord some day. If I’m wrong I’ll humbly ask your pardon.”

“And if I’m wrong I will yours,” cried Richard. “Now, then, what of Payne’s visit?”

“You will have to meet the Major,” said the Colonel gravely.

“Yes, I suppose so. He could not forgive such an insult as that.”

“You treat it very lightly, Dick. The consequences may be very grave.”

“I hope not,” said Richard. “I am not a soldier, but I am not going to show the white feather, even if I wear it in my heart.”

“Not you,” said the Colonel, as he tapped his companion on the shoulder. “But I should have liked you to be fighting on account of some other lady.”

“And I should not,” cried Richard. “Is this likely to be serious?”

“I should be no true friend to you, my lad, if I concealed the truth from you. It may be very serious.”

“For me?”

“I don’t say that.”

“But I never fired a pistol in my life, and I fence horribly.”

“It will be pistols, Dick. I arranged that it should be. But you will be cool?”

“I hope I shall be just as I am now,” said Richard calmly.

The Colonel looked at him intently, but no nerve showed a tremor.

“A good walk will do you good,” he said, and after telling him the preliminaries, and the place where they were to meet, the conversation was changed and they walked slowly on till the edge of the Downs was reached, and they soon after entered an extensive wood, walking down a leafy glade where all seemed wonderfully peaceful, and its solemnity was so soothing to Richard Linnell that he was about to throw himself upon the turf when Colonel Mellersh stopped short, and pointing to a gnarled beech of stunted growth, exclaimed:

“That will do exactly.”

“Do?” said Linnell. “Do for what?”

“Why, my dear boy, do you suppose I have brought you out here for nothing? No; since the abominable code for furbishing up injured honour exists, and a man may be called out, it is our duty to prepare for emergencies. You cannot use a pistol?”

“No,” said Richard, shaking his head.

“I can. I have been out six times, and I’m going to show you how to hit your man and save yourself.”

“I don’t want to hit Major Rockley.”

“But I want you to hit him and save yourself. My dear boy, you are worth five thousand Major Rockleys to your father, and we must not have you hurt.”

As he spoke, to Richard’s great surprise, he took out a brace of duelling pistols with flask and bullets, and after loading skilfully he took a few cards from his breast, and going to the stunted tree, tacked one on each of two boughs about on a level with a man’s outstretched arms, another on the trunk, and another higher still, where the head would be.

“I used to practise with the pistol a great deal at one time, Dick, and I could hit either of those address cards as many times as I liked.”

“Then I will not quarrel with you and call you out.”

“Don’t,” said the Colonel, handing him a pistol, and proceeding to step out fifteen paces. “There,” he said, “stand there and aim at that card on the trunk. That is where a man’s heart would be. I will count slowly, and when I come to three, raise your pistol quickly and fire.”

“One – two —three!”

Richard Linnell raised his pistol, and drew the trigger, but there was no report.

“It will not go off,” he said.

“No,” replied the Colonel; “pistols never will, unless you cock them.”

“Pish!” ejaculated Richard, repairing the omission. “Again.”

The Colonel counted once more; there was a flash, a sharp report, and a leaf or two fell from high up a tree to the right of the target.

“Take the other,” said the Colonel quietly; “hold it a little more firmly, and raise it slowly. The moment your eye glances straight along the barrel, press the trigger softly, so as not to jerk the pistol. Ready? Now – one – two —three!”

There was another sharp report, and the Colonel smiled.

“That’s better,” he said. “Your first bullet went over the enemy’s head twenty feet or so. That one would have him in the shoulder. Try again.”

The Colonel busied himself loading the pistols with all the quickness of an adept as his pupil fired, keeping him at it for quite a couple of hours, with intervals of rest. Now he made him fire at one card, then at another, practising as at his adversary’s arms, head, and body, till Richard looked at him wearily.

“Yes; that will do now,” said Colonel Mellersh. “You may congratulate yourself, Dick, upon being a horribly bad shot; but you will be able to handle your pistol properly, and raise it like a man who is used to the weapon.”

“What is the use of that,” said Richard, smiling, “if I cannot aim straight?”

“A great deal. If you had taken hold of your pistol in a bungling way to-morrow, Rockley would have felt that he had you at his mercy, and he would have been as cool as a fish. Now he will see that you know what a pistol is, and be perfectly ignorant of the fact that you are unskilful of aim. He will think he has a dangerous adversary before him, and be more likely nervous than cool.”

“I see,” said Richard, with his eyes lighting up. “I’ve had my turn at the scoundrel, and I’m satisfied. Of course I don’t want to hit him, but at the same time I don’t want him to hit me.”

“Oh!” said the Colonel drily, “I thought you did.”

“What! want him to hit me! Why?”

“You seemed so cool over it.”

“Oh, but I’m not,” said Richard gravely. “I suppose a good shot would hit one of those cards?”

“Time was, Dick, when I could have put half a dozen shots in either of them. I don’t know that I could hit one now.”

He raised the pistol he had been loading as he spoke, took a quick aim, and hit the centre card just on the edge, driving it into the bark of the tree.

“Bad!” he said. “Let’s try another.”

He aimed at the card representing the enemy’s right arm fired, and struck it also about a quarter of an inch from the edge.

“Out of practice, Dick,” he said, thrusting the pistols into their dark cloth bags, and replacing them in his pocket. “There, my lad, let’s get home. Dine lightly this evening, go to bed in good time, and have a long night’s rest.”

“When is the meeting?” said Richard calmly.

“At six to-morrow morning.”

“Where did you say?”

“On the sands, two miles out below the east cliff.”

“Why there?”

“We shall want an excuse for going out so early, my lad. We can be going to bathe, and so be unnoticed, and there will be no fear of an interruption,” said the Colonel grimly. “This is to be no play affair, Dick. An officer in His Majesty’s service cannot submit to a horse-whipping from a civilian without trying to get ample satisfaction.”

He looked at Richard with a grave air of pity in his countenance.

“Did you ever shoot a man?” said Richard, as they were walking briskly back.

“Do you mean wounded or killed?”

“The latter.”

“Once, Dick.”

The young man’s countenance contracted, and he looked at his companion almost in horror.

“Yes,” said the Colonel; “it is horrible, Dick, and the remembrance that the man was an utter scoundrel does not make the fact much less horrible after all these years.”

They walked on for some distance in silence, before Richard Linnell broke in upon his companion’s reverie.

“Was the duel about – a lady?”

The Colonel uttered a harsh laugh.

“It’s an arrangement of nature, my dear Ulysses,” he said. “If you see a couple of stags smashing their antlers, a couple of bulls goring each other, or two rams battering one another’s heads, a brace of pheasants or barn-door cocks pecking and spurring each other to death, what’s it about? A lady. The same with mankind, Dick; a duel is almost invariably more or less directly about a lady.”

Richard Linnell went on thoughtfully for a time, and then turned with a sad smile to the Colonel.

“So even you had to do battle once in such a cause?”

“Not exactly, Dick; it was upon another’s behalf. An utter scoundrel, just such a fellow as Rockley, did my best friend a mortal wrong. One day, Dick, it was a happy, peaceful home that I used to visit, where as sweet-natured, true, and gentle a man as ever breathed lived in happy trust and faith in his sweet young wife; the next there was a stain – an indelible stain – upon that hearth-stone, and my poor friend lay stricken down by the shock, and nearly died of the brain fever that ensued.”