The Place of Honeymoons
the much abused footstool, which he kicked whenever it came in the line of
his march. In his soul he knew that Courtlandt was right. More than that,
he knew that presently he would seek him and apologize.
Unfortunately, neither of them counted on the colonel.
Without being quite conscious of the act, Abbott took down from the wall
an ancient dueling-pistol, cocked it, snapped it, and looked it over with
an interest that he had never before bestowed on it. And the colonel,
bursting into the studio, found him absorbed in the contemplation of this
old death-dealing instrument.
"Ha!" roared the old war dog. "Had an idea that something like this was
going to happen. Put that up. You couldn't kill anything with that unless
you hit 'em on the head with it. Leave the matter to me. I've a pair of
pistols, sighted to hit a shilling at twenty yards. Of course, you can't
fight him with swords. He's one of the best in all Italy. But you've just
as good a chance as he has with pistols. Nine times out of ten the tyro
hits the bull's-eye, while the crack goes wild. Just you sit jolly tight.
Who's his second; Courtlandt?"
"Yes." Abbott was truly and completely bewildered.
"He struck you first, I understand, and you knocked him down. Good! My
tennis-courts are out of the way. We can settle this matter to-morrow
morning at dawn. Ellicott will come over from Cadenabbia with his saws.
He's close-mouthed. All you need to do is to keep quiet. You can spend the
night at the villa with me, and I'll give you a few ideas about shooting a
pistol. Here; write what I dictate." He pushed Abbott over to the desk and
forced him into the chair. Abbott wrote mechanically, as one hypnotized.
The colonel seized the letter. "No flowery sentences; a few words bang at
the mark. Come up to the villa as soon as you can. We'll jolly well cool
this Italian's blood."
And out he went, banging the door. There was something of the directness
of a bullet in the old fellow's methods.
Literally, Abbott had been rushed off his feet. The moment his confusion
cleared he saw the predicament into which his own stupidity and the
amiable colonel's impetuous good offices had plunged him. He was
horrified. Here was Courtlandt carrying the apology, and hot on his heels
was the colonel, with the final arrangements for the meeting. He ran to
the door, bareheaded, took the stairs three and four at a bound. But the
energetic Anglo-Indian had gone down in bounds also; and when the
distracted artist reached the street, the other was nowhere to be seen.
Apparently there was nothing left but to send another apology. Rather than
perform so shameful and cowardly an act he would have cut off his hand.
The Barone, pale and determined, passed the second note to Courtlandt who
was congratulating himself (prematurely as will be seen) on the peaceful
dispersion of the war-clouds. He was dumfounded.
"You will excuse me," he said meekly. He must see Abbott.
"A moment," interposed the Barone coldly. "If it is to seek another
apology, it will be useless. I refuse to accept. Mr. Abbott will fight, or
I will publicly brand him, the first opportunity, as a coward."
Courtlandt bit his mustache. "In that case, I shall go at once to Colonel
Caxley-Webster."
"Thank you. I shall be in my room at the villa the greater part of the
day." The Barone bowed.
Courtlandt caught the colonel as he was entering his motor-boat.
"Come over to tiffin."
"Very well; I can talk here better than anywhere else."
When the motor began its racket, Courtlandt pulled the colonel over to
him.
"Do you know what you have done?"
"Done?" dropping his eye-glass.
"Yes. Knowing that Abbott would have no earthly chance against the
Italian, I went to him and forced him to write an apology. And you have
blown the whole thing higher than a kite."
The colonel's eyes bulged. "Dem it, why didn't the young fool tell me?"
"Your hurry probably rattled him. But what are we going to do? I'm not
going to have the boy hurt. I love him as a brother; though, just now, he
regards me as a mortal enemy. Perhaps I am," moodily. "I have deceived
him, and somehow--blindly it is true--he knows it. I am as full of deceit
as a pomegranate is of seeds."
"Have him send another apology."
"The Barone is thoroughly enraged. He would refuse to accept it, and said
so."
"Well, dem me for a well-meaning meddler!"
"With pleasure, but that will not stop the row. There is a way out, but it
appeals to me as damnably low."
"Oh, Abbott will not run. He isn't that kind."
"No, he'll not run. But if you will agree with me, honor may be satisfied
without either of them getting hurt."
"Women beat the devil, don't they? What's your plan?"
Courtlandt outlined it.
The colonel frowned. "That doesn't sound like you. Beastly trick."
"I know it."
"We'll lunch first. It will take a few pegs to get that idea through this
bally head of mine."
When Abbott came over later that day, he was subdued in manner. He laughed
occasionally, smoked a few cigars, but declined stimulants. He even played
a game of tennis creditably. And after dinner he shot a hundred billiards.
The colonel watched his hands keenly. There was not the slightest
indication of nerves.
"Hang the boy!" he muttered. "I ought to be ashamed of myself. There isn't
a bit of funk in his whole make-up."
At nine Abbott retired. He did not sleep very well. He was irked by the
morbid idea that the Barone was going to send the bullet through his
throat. He was up at five. He strolled about the garden. He realized that
it was very good to be alive. Once he gazed somberly at the little white
villa, away to the north. How crisply it stood out against the dark
foliage! How blue the water was! And far, far away the serene snowcaps!
Nora Harrigan ... Well, he was going to stand up like a man. She should
never be ashamed of her memory of him. If he went out, all worry would be
at an end, and that would be something. What a mess he had made of things!
He did not blame the Italian. A duel! he, the son of a man who had
invented wash-tubs, was going to fight a duel! He wanted to laugh; he
wanted to cry. Wasn't he just dreaming? Wasn't it all a nightmare out of
which he would presently awake?
"Breakfast, Sahib," said Rao, deferentially touching his arm.
He was awake; it was all true.
"You'll want coffee," began the colonel. "Drink as much as you like. And
you'll find the eggs good, too." The colonel wanted to see if Abbott ate
well.
The artist helped himself twice and drank three cups of coffee. "You know,
I suppose all men in a hole like this have funny ideas. I was just
thinking that I should like a partridge and a bottle of champagne."
"We'll have that for tiffin," said the colonel, confidentially. In fact,
he summoned the butler and gave the order.
"It's mighty kind of you, Colonel, to buck me up this way."
"Rot!" The colonel experienced a slight heat in his leathery cheeks. "All
you've got to do is to hold your arm out straight, pull the trigger, and
squint afterward."
"I sha'n't hurt the Barone," smiling faintly.
"Are you going to be ass enough to pop your gun in the air?" indignantly.
Abbott shrugged; and the colonel cursed himself for the guiltiest
scoundrel unhung.
Half an hour later the opponents stood at each end of the tennis-court.
Ellicott, the surgeon, had laid open his medical case. He was the most
agitated of the five men. His fingers shook as he spread out the lints and
bandages. The colonel and Courtlandt had solemnly gone through the
formality of loading the weapons. The sun had not climbed over the eastern
summits, but the snow on the western tops was rosy.
"At the word three, gentlemen, you will fire," said the colonel.
The two shots came simultaneously. Abbott had deliberately pointed his
into the air. For a moment he stood perfectly still; then, his knees
sagged, and he toppled forward on his face.
"Great God!" whispered the colonel; "you must have forgotten the ramrod!"
He, Courtlandt, and the surgeon rushed over to the fallen man. The Barone
stood like stone. Suddenly, with a gesture of horror, he flung aside his
smoking pistol and ran across the court.
"Gentlemen," he cried, "on my honor, I aimed three feet above his head."
He wrung his hands together in anxiety. "It is impossible! It is only that
I wished to see if he were a brave man. I shoot well. It is impossible!"
he reiterated.
Rapidly the cunning hand of the surgeon ran over Abbott's body. He finally
shook his head. "Nothing has touched him. His heart gave under. Fainted."
When Abbott came to his senses, he smiled weakly. The Barone was one of
the two who helped him to his feet.
"I feel like a fool," he said.
"Ah, let me apologize now," said the Barone. "What I did at the ball was
wrong, and I should not have lost my temper. I had come to you to
apologize then. But I am Italian. It is natural that I should lose my
temper," naively.
"We're both of us a pair of fools, Barone. There was always some one else.
A couple of fools."
"Yes," admitted the Barone eagerly.
"Considering," whispered the colonel in Courtlandt's ear; "considering
that neither of them knew they were shooting nothing more dangerous than
wads, they're pretty good specimens. Eh, what?"
CHAPTER XIX
COURTLANDT TELLS A STORY
The Colonel and his guests at luncheon had listened to Courtlandt without
sound or movement beyond the occasional rasp of feet shifting under the
table. He had begun with the old familiar phrase--"I've got a story."
"Tell it," had been the instant request.
At the beginning the men had been leaning at various negligent
angles,--some with their elbows upon the table, some with their arms
thrown across the backs of their chairs. The partridge had been excellent,
the wine delicious, the tobacco irreproachable. Burma, the tinkle of bells
in the temples, the strange pictures in the bazaars, long journeys over
smooth and stormy seas; romance, moving and colorful, which began at
Rangoon, had zigzagged around the world, and ended in Berlin.
"And so," concluded the teller of the tale, "that is the story. This man
was perfectly innocent of any wrong, a victim of malice on the one hand
and of injustice on the other."
"Is that the end of the yarn?" asked the colonel.
"Who in life knows what the end of anything is? This is not a story out of
a book." Courtlandt accepted a fresh cigar from the box which Rao passed
to him, and dropped his dead weed into the ash-bowl.
"Has he given up?" asked Abbott, his voice strangely unfamiliar in his own
ears.
"A man can struggle just so long against odds, then he wins or becomes
broken. Women are not logical; generally they permit themselves to be
guided by impulse rather than by reason. This man I am telling you about
was proud; perhaps too proud. It is a shameful fact, but he ran away.
True, he wrote letter after letter, but all these were returned unopened.
Then he stopped."
"A woman would a good deal rather believe circumstantial evidence than
not. Humph!" The colonel primed his pipe and relighted it. "She couldn't
have been worth much."
"Worth much!" cried Abbott. "What do you imply by that?"
"No man will really give up a woman who is really worth while, that is, of
course, admitting that your man, Courtlandt, _is_ a man. Perhaps, though,
it was his fault. He was not persistent enough, maybe a bit spineless. The
fact that he gave up so quickly possibly convinced her that her
impressions were correct. Why, I'd have followed her day in and day out,
year after year; never would I have let up until I had proved to her that
she had been wrong."
"The colonel is right," Abbott approved, never taking his eyes off