Athelstane Ford

The luck I had in this was very various, so that at one time guineas seemed to be dropping out of my pockets, whereas at others I might ransack them through without finding so much as a silver penny. And according to the state of my fortunes, so did I prosper in Marian’s regard; and in this ill-state of my affairs I grew reckless, and drank to drive away better thoughts, and so came on rapidly to the evil hour which was to end it all.

For, as it happened, I was one night throwing the dice with my cousin Rupert, and he had won of me, and as I went on, drinking in between whiles, I lost what little coolness I had started with, and finally staked my last penny on the last throw, and lost that too. Then I flung myself back from the table with an oath.

“Fair and softly, cousin,” said Rupert, picking up the money I had thrown before him. “It does not much matter who wins, seeing that it all goes into the same pocket afterwards.”

“What do you mean?” I cried sharply. For nothing angered me more than to have him say anything which glanced at our rivalry for Marian, in which business I had too much reason to suspect he was more fortunate than myself. That very day, moreover, I had found them together, and they had looked ill-pleased at being disturbed.

“Faith, I think you must know my meaning well enough by this time,” answered Rupert, with an insulting smile. “Before you try to play the gallant you must line your pocket better.”

“Hold your tongue!” I said fiercely. “I am not used to buy favours, like some who have nothing but their purse to commend them.”

“Then you should go where favours are not sold,” he sneered, with an evil smile.

“Those words in your teeth!” I shouted, starting up and clapping my hand on my sword, which I had bought two days before of a Jew.

By this time the noise of our quarrel had aroused the whole room, and the company were crowding round us, the men of the Fair Maid in the front. Rupert bit his lip as he saw where he stood.

“Peace, youngster,” he said, with a threatening look which belied his words. “I will not be forced into a quarrel here.”

“Here or outside, I care not,” says I, “but I swear you shall take back the slander you have cast upon a woman you are not fit to speak with!”

“D – n you!” says Rupert, “do you want me to fight for a – ”

He got no farther, for with that I caught up the dice-box and dashed it between his eyes, so that he fairly staggered back, and the blood started from his nostrils. And then, almost before I knew what was happening, his sword was out, and mine was clashing against it, and the table was overturned on the floor, and then there was a rush and a shout, and some one was holding me back from behind, while Mr. Sims and the boatswain stood between us, and Rupert, with a look on his face which I had never seen there before, was saying in a very steady voice —

“Gentlemen, you may arrange it as you please, but take notice that it must be à la mort.”

CHAPTER IV

“À LA MORT”

So it had come to this, that before the dust of my father’s fields was well off my shoes I was committed to a duel to the death with a desperate, vindictive man, who had been steeped in bloodshed before I had ever handled a sword, and that man my own near kinsman.

At the time I was less frightened than I have often been since in thinking over it. The others were more alarmed for me than I was for myself, and I heard Mr. Sims and old Muzzy urging upon Rupert to let the matter go no further. But this he would not now hear of, and in the state of mind I was then in I should have been little better satisfied than he to have had the affair patched up.

At last they saw it was of no use to seek an accommodation between us, and they withdrew together to settle how we were to fight, Captain Sims, as I understood, acting in my cousin’s interest, while the boatswain did the same office for me.

While they were discussing it, which it took them some time to do, Rupert and I sat on opposite sides of the room. He put on a great air of indifference, talking familiarly with those of his friends who stood about him, while I could do nothing but stare across at him with a horrible fascination, as the man by whose hand, in all likelihood, I was to die within the next half-hour. I remember noting for the first time what a finely formed person he had, tall and supple as a lath of steel. As far as that went I was no weakling, and I have been told that at that time we greatly resembled each other, though I do not think I can ever have shared my cousin’s good looks.

I was becoming feverish over the delay of our seconds, if such they can be called, when they rose from their corner, and the boatswain came across to me with a very grave air, Mr. Sims at the same time going over to Rupert.

“We have arranged,” the boatswain said to me, in a serious voice, “that you are to fight out at sea. A boat is to be moored to the buoy off the mouth of the river, and you will be rowed out and put into it together, one at each end. You are to be armed with cutlasses and left there together. There will be a pair of sculls on board, and the one who kills the other will throw his body overboard, so as to leave no trace, and then row ashore. If the boat does not return at the end of an hour, we shall come out to her to see what has happened. Do you agree to this?”

He spoke these words in a distinct, loud voice, so as to be overheard by those who stood next. Then, before I could answer, he bent over quickly and laid his lips to my ear, whispering —

“Refuse it, boy, refuse it! It will be a narrow match enough between you with the cutlass, which was the weapon I stuck out for for your sake. But out in a trumpery rocking boat, with you a landlubber against a man that has been at sea these ten years, I would not give a farden for your life.”

He said this with many strong oaths, for I honestly believe the old pirate had got an affection for me. But he wasted his breath as far as I was concerned, my pride being then too fierce to admit of my shrinking from any terms that might be offered by the other side.

“Tell them I accept,” I said sullenly, “and make no more ado about it. How soon can we reach this place?”

The old fellow cursed me roundly for an obstinate, bloody-minded young fool.

“Give me a hug,” he wound up by saying, “for blast me if you ain’t a youngster after my own heart!” And he fell to and embraced me heartily, kissing me on both cheeks, and shedding tears plentifully; for he was three-parts drunk, and clearly looked upon me as a dead man.

And in that light I saw that the company present regarded me, my cousin’s prowess being well known by many duels which he had fought in the past; and though I had pretty well made up my mind that I was to die, I suffered no small discouragement and chagrin from the compassionate looks which were cast upon me. My old enemy, Trickster Tim, also thought this a safe occasion to insult me, coming up close before me and peering into my face, as if I were already so much carrion. Nor had I the spirit to resent his insolence.

Captain Sims now led the way out of the house, holding Rupert by the arm, while I followed with my friend. The rest of the crew swarmed out after us, but old Muzzy sharply ordered them back, taking only two men to pull the oars, for we had a long way to row before the buoy could be reached.

It was a miserable voyage for me, sitting there in the stern, not three paces from Rupert, shivering in the cold night air, and perhaps from fear as well, as we dropped slowly down the river, past the black piles of the landing jetties and the sleeping ships. Our course was lit only by the stars, save where a ship’s light cast a sickly gleam upon the water as we approached it, and faded away as we rowed on. The whole way I never once opened my lips, but the others talked together in low voices, turning themselves away from me in the same manner as if I were a convict being led to execution. And as for my own thoughts, they were distracted enough, especially when I called to mind my dear mother and my good and upright father, and how little they imagined the business in which I was now engaged. These reflections so softened me that I believe if my cousin had made the least move towards a reconcilement my whole wrath would have melted away. But no doubt he had made up his mind that only my death could restore his authority amongst the ruffians whom he led.

At last our dreary passage was ended, and we were arrived at the place agreed on for the encounter. We had towed down a smaller boat in our wake, and this they now fastened to the buoy, and we stepped into it, Rupert at the bows and I at the stern. Then the boatswain gripped my hand for the last time, whispering to me to beware of Gurney’s upper-cut, and so they bade us farewell and rowed off quickly in the darkness, like men who would avoid the sight of a murder.

So there were we, left alone in that frail compartment, out there upon the heaving water, with nothing but death in our hearts. I had but time to breathe a prayer, which I did with some misgiving as to how it would be received, when my cousin drew his cutlass and stepped into the centre of the boat. I rose to meet him with my weapon in my hand, and we stood there facing one another, with only the width of the seat between us.

“Are you ready?” says Rupert quickly. And before I had time to answer he brought down his cutlass with such force that unless I had guarded it the blade would have split open my head.

It was now that I had reason to be thankful for the lessons I had received at the hands of the boatswain, for Rupert’s blows came so thick and fast that I had all I could do to parry them. I bore his last caution to me in mind, and soon found the importance of it, for though my cousin made many feints at my shoulder and other parts of my body, yet the only blow into which he put his real force was the upper-cut at my head.

I kept my eyes fixed upon his, as I had been taught, and soon saw a savage light arising therein when he found he made so little impression on me. Indeed, if we had fought on firm ground I believe that, as the boatswain said, I should have been his match, but the rocking of the boat gave him an advantage, and presently he pursued a feint further than I expected, and gave me a gash of about three inches long in my left thigh.

The first smart of the wound made me gasp for breath, but the next moment it had so raised my fury that I left off the defensive and fell upon my enemy with all my might, hitting and slashing so desperately that, do what he would, I broke down his guard and laid open his forehead over his right eye, and the blood began to trickle down his face.

This transformed his own anger into a tempest, and now, indeed, we went at it more like two savages than Christian men. For the cutlass, by the very reason that it is not so deadly an instrument as the small-sword, is capable of inflicting a very great many wounds before any fatal effect takes place. And so, becoming less heedful of our guard as we warmed to it, we wounded each other all over the body in a most desperate manner, till my cousin seemed to me to be covered with blood from head to foot, and I can have been little better, for I felt the blood running from me at above a dozen places.

My enemy was the first to see the folly of this, for he began to change his tactics, drawing back from my assault and keeping on the defensive till he should lure me on to give him an advantage. And in this at length he had nearly succeeded, but happening to forget the seat which lay behind him in the bows of the boat, he overbalanced himself against it and fell backwards, still gripping his weapon in his hand.

I scorned to take advantage of this accident, but stayed where I was to give him time to get up. He lay upon his back for a minute, glaring sullenly at me to see if I would kill him. But finding that I had no such mind he recovered himself nimbly enough. And being, no doubt, still further enraged at this accident having put him, as it were, into my power, he now made at me with the most terrible vehemence, raining down blows upon me sufficient to have felled an ox. And then in the midst of it all, while I was warding off his fury, and the sparks flew from our weapons every instant, I suddenly felt my hand jarred as though I had touched a conger, and the blade of my cutlass snapped off at the hilt with a crash, and I stood there at his mercy.

He stopped short, as much astonished as I was, while I sank down on the seat next the stern, ready to sob, and put up my hands before my face.

“That cursed Jew has cheated me of my life!” I groaned between my set teeth.

Rupert rested the point of his cutlass upon the seat in front of him and looked over at me curiously.

“Young man,” he said, “your life is forfeit to me, and it hath never been said that Rupert Gurney spared an enemy. Yet, inasmuch as you are of my blood and but raw in the world, I have half a mind to make terms with you. Will you make your apology for the violence you put upon me in the tavern, and swear to repeat its terms before all those who were witnesses of our dispute?”

I looked up at him and smiled bitterly in his face.

“Do you understand me so little, and you a Ford by the mother’s side?” I answered him. “Now that I have no weapon you may murder me if you will, but apology you shall have none from me – unless,” I added, “you take back your insult to the woman I love.”

“You young fool!” he ground out savagely. “That drab you make such a to-do about has been mine this two months past.”

I leave it unsaid how these words affected me, both then and for long afterwards. For up to that moment I had looked upon the girl with as pure a reverence as any boy ever cherished for a maid, and my cousin’s vile boast, cast it back to him as I might, sank into my mind and worked there like a poison.

“I believe you lie,” I said to him with marvellous coldness. For what with the loss of blood, and the despair which had seized upon me at the breaking of my weapon, and the news I had just received, I was become quite dispirited, and was indifferent to what he might do with me.

“Die, then, since you will have me kill you!” he exclaimed, and began advancing down the boat towards me.