The two gentlemen who were in their shirt sleeves despite
the brisk chill of a spring morning were about to blow
each other's brains out. Or attempt to do so, at least.
They were standing on a secluded stretch of dew-wet lawn
in London's Hyde Park, facing in different directions,
each ignoring the other's existence until the moment
should come to take aim at each other and shoot to kill.
They were not alone, however, this being a duel of honor
in which due process had been followed. A gauntlet had
been thrown down, even if not literally, and challenger
and challenged had progressed toward this morning's
meeting through the medium of their seconds. Both seconds
were now present, as were a surgeon and a gathering of
interested spectators, all male, who had risen early from
their beds — or had not yet gone to them after the revels
of the night before — for the sheer exhilaration of
watching two of their peers attempt to put a period to
each other's existence.
One of the duelists, the challenger, the shorter and
stockier of the two, was stamping his booted feet,
flexing
his fingers, and licking his dry lips with a drier
tongue.
He was almost as pale as his shirt.
"Yes, you may ask him," he told his second through teeth
that he tried in vain to keep from chattering. "Not that
he will do it, mind, but one must be decent about such
matters."
His second strode off smartly to confer with his
counterpart, who in his turn approached the other
duelist.
That tall, elegant gentleman showed to advantage without
his coat. His white shirt did nothing to hide the
powerful
muscles of his arms, shoulders, and chest, as hisbreeches
and top boots only accentuated those of his long legs. He
was nonchalantly engaged in smoothing the lace of his
cuffs over the backs of his long-fingered, well-manicured
hands and holding a desultory conversation with his
friends.
"Oliver is shaking like a leaf in a strong breeze," Baron
Pottier observed, his quizzing glass to his eye. "He
could
not hit the broad side of a cathedral from thirty paces,
Tresham."
"His teeth are clacking like trotting hooves too,"
Viscount Kimble added.
"Are you intending to kill him, Tresham?" young Mr.
Maddox
asked, drawing to himself a cool, arrogant stare from the
duelist.
"It is the nature of duels, is it not?" he answered.
"Breakfast at White's afterward, Tresh?" Viscount Kimble
suggested. "And Tattersall's after that? I have my eye on
a new matched pair of grays for my curricle."
"As soon as this little matter has been taken care of."
But the duelist was distracted both from straightening
his
cuffs and from his conversation by the approach of his
second. "Well, Conan?" he asked, a touch of impatience in
his voice. "Is there good reason for this delay? I must
confess myself eager for my breakfast."
Sir Conan Brougham was accustomed to the man's cool
nerve.
He had served as his second during three previous duels,
after all of which his friend had consumed a hearty
breakfast, unharmed and perfectly composed, as if he had
been engaged for the morning in nothing more lethal than
a
brisk ride in the park.
"Lord Oliver is prepared to accept a properly worded
apology," he said.
There were jeering noises from their acquaintances.
Eyes of such a dark brown that many people mistook their
color for black looked back into Sir Conan's without
blinking. The narrow, arrogant, handsome face to which
they belonged was expressionless except for one slightly
elevated eyebrow.
"He has challenged me for cuckolding him but is willing
to
settle for a simple apology?" he said. "Do I need to
spell
out my answer, Conan? Did you need to consult me?"
"It might be worth considering," his friend advised. "I
would not be doing my job conscientiously if I did not
thus advise you, Tresham. Oliver is a pretty decent
shot."
"Then let him prove it by killing me," the duelist said
carelessly. "And let that be within minutes rather than
hours, my dear fellow. The spectators are displaying
distinct signs of boredom."
Sir Conan shook his head, shrugged, and strode away to
inform Viscount Russell, Lord Oliver's second, that his
grace, the Duke of Tresham, did not acknowledge the
necessity of any apology to Lord Oliver.
There was nothing for it then but to proceed to business.
Viscount Russell in particular was anxious to have the
meeting over with. Hyde Park, even this secluded corner
of
it, was a rashly public place in which to hold a duel,
illegal as such meetings were. Wimbledon Common, the more
usual venue for affairs of honor, would have been safer.
But his friend had insisted on the park.
The pistols had been loaded and carefully inspected by
both seconds. While an expectant hush fell over the
spectators, the protagonists each picked up a weapon
without looking at the other. They took up their
positions
back to back and at the agreed-upon signal paced out the
regulation number of steps before turning. They took
careful aim, each standing sideways in order to offer as
narrow a target as possible to the other. They waited for
Viscount Russell to drop the white handkerchief he held
aloft, the signal to fire.
The hush became an almost tangible thing.
And then two things happened simultaneously.
The handkerchief was released.
And someone shrieked.
"Stop!" the voice cried. "Stop!"
It was a female voice, and it came from the direction of
a
grove of trees some distance away. An indignant buzz
arose
from the spectators, who had held themselves properly
silent and motionless so that the protagonists would have
no distraction.
The Duke of Tresham, startled and furious, lowered his
right arm and turned in order to glare in the direction
of
the person who had dared interrupt such a meeting at such
a moment.
Lord Oliver, who had also wavered for a moment, recovered
fast, corrected his aim, and fired his pistol.
The female screamed.
His grace did not go down. Indeed at first it did not
appear that he had even been hit. But a bright red spot
appeared on his calf, an inch or two above the top of one
perfectly polished leather boot, just as if suddenly
painted there by an invisible hand with a long-handled
brush.
"Shame!" Baron Pottier called from the sidelines. "For
shame, Oliver!"
His voice was joined by others, all censuring the man who
had taken unfair advantage of his opponent's distraction.
Sir Conan began to stride toward the duke while the
crimson spot increased in diameter and the surgeon bent
over his bag. But his grace held up his left hand in a
firm staying gesture before raising his right arm again
and taking aim with his pistol. It did not waver. Neither
did his face show any expression except intense, narrow-
eyed concentration on his target, who had no choice now
but to stand and await his death.
Lord Oliver, to his credit, stood very still, though the
hand that held his pistol to his side was trembling
noticeably.
The spectators were silent again. So was the unidentified
woman. There was an air of almost unbearable tension.
And then the Duke of Tresham, as he had done at every
previous duel in which he had been engaged, bent his arm
at the elbow and shot into the air.
The red spot on his breeches spread outward in rapidly
expanding concentric circles.
It had taken iron willpower to remain standing when it
felt as if a thousand needles had exploded in his leg.
But
even though incensed with Lord Oliver for firing his
pistol when any true gentleman would have waited for the
duel to be reorganized, Jocelyn Dudley, Duke of Tresham,
had never had any intention of killing or even wounding
him. Only of making him sweat awhile, of giving him time
to watch his life flash before his eyes and wonder if
this
would be the one occasion when the duke, famed as a
deadly
shot but also known as a man who contemptuously wasted
his
bullet on the air during duels, would act untrue to form.
The needle points had taken over his whole person by the
time he had finished and tossed the pistol onto the wet
grass. He felt like agony personified and remained
upright
only because he would be damned before giving Oliver the
satisfaction of being able to claim that he had been
felled.
He was also still angry. An understatement. He was in a
white-hot fury that might have been directed against
Oliver had there not been a more obvious target.
He turned his head and looked with narrowed gaze to the
spot at the edge of the trees where she had been standing
a few moments ago, shrieking like a banshee. A serving
girl, running an early-morning errand, no doubt, and
forgetting one of the primary rules of service — that one
minded one's own business and left one's betters to mind
theirs. A girl who needed to be taught a lesson she would
never forget.
She was still there, staring as if transfixed, both hands
pressed to her mouth, though she had stopped her
caterwauling. It was a pity she was a woman. It would
have
given him intense satisfaction to set a horsewhip
whistling about her hide before being carted away to have
his leg attended to. Deuce take it, but he was engulfed
in
pain.
Only a few moments had passed since he had fired his
pistol and tossed it down. Both Brougham and the surgeon
were hurrying toward him. The spectators were buzzing
with
excitement. He heard one voice distinctly.
"Well done, by Jove, Tresh," Viscount Kimble called. "You
would have contaminated your bullet by shooting it into
the bastard."
Jocelyn held up his left hand again without looking away
from the woman by the trees. With his right hand he
beckoned imperiously to her.
If she had been wise, she would have turned and run. He
was hardly in a position to go chasing after her, and he
doubted that anyone else present would be interested in
running to earth on his behalf an unappealing, gray-clad
slip of a servant girl.
She was not wise. She took a few tentative steps toward
him and then hurried the rest of the way until she was
standing almost toe to toe with him.
"You fool!" she cried with angry disregard for her place
on the social scale and the consequences of talking thus
to a peer of the realm. "What an utterly idiotic thing to
do. Have you no more respect for your life than to become
embroiled in a stupid duel? And now you have been hurt. I
would have to say it serves you right."
His eyes narrowed further as he determinedly ignored the
pulsing pain in his leg and the near impossibility of
standing any longer on it.
"Silence, wench!" he commanded coldly. "If I had died
here
this morning, you would as like as not have hanged for
murder. Have you no more respect for your life than to
interfere in what is no concern of yours?"
Her cheeks had been flushed with anger. They paled at his
words, and she stared at him wide-eyed, her lips
compressed in a hard line.
"Tresham," Sir Conan said from close by, "we had better
get that leg attended to, old chap. You are losing blood.
Let me carry you with Kimble here over to the blanket the
surgeon has spread out."
"Carry?" Jocelyn laughed derisively. He had not taken his
eyes off the serving girl. "You, girl. Give me your
shoulder."
"Tresham—" Sir Conan sounded exasperated.
"I am on my way to work," the girl said. "I will be late
if I do not hurry."
But Jocelyn had already availed himself of her shoulder.
He leaned heavily on it, more heavily than he had
intended. Moving at last, shifting the weight off his
injured leg, he found that the wave of agony made a
mockery of the pain hitherto.
"You are the cause of this, my girl," he said grimly,
taking one tentative step toward the surgeon, who
suddenly
seemed an impossible distance away. "You will, by God,
lend me your assistance and keep your impertinent tongue
safely housed behind your teeth."
Lord Oliver was pulling his waistcoat and coat back on
while Viscount Russell packed away his pistol and came
striding past Jocelyn to retrieve the other one.
"You would do better," the girl said, "to swallow your
pride and allow your friends to carry you."
Her shoulder did not bow beneath his weight. She was
rather tall and slender, but she was no weakling. She was
doubtless accustomed to hard manual labor. She was
probably equally accustomed to cuffings and beatings for
impudence. He had never heard the like from a servant
girl.
He was well-nigh swooning by the time he reached the
blanket the surgeon had spread on the grass beneath an
oak
tree.
"Lie down, your grace," he instructed, "and I will see
what damage has been done. I do not like the look of the
positioning of that wound, I must confess. Or all the
blood. I daresay the leg will need to come off."
He spoke as if he were a barber who had discovered a tuft
of hair that did not blend well with the rest of the
head.
He was a retired army sawbones, supplied by Lord Oliver.
Bloodletting and amputation were probably his answer to
every physical ailment.
Jocelyn swore eloquently.
"You cannot possibly know that from a single glance," the
serving girl had the temerity to observe, addressing the
surgeon, "or make such a dire prediction."
"Conan," Jocelyn said, his teeth clamping tightly now in
a
vain attempt to control the pain, "fetch my horse." It
was
tethered not far away.
There was a chorus of protests from his friends who had
gathered around him.
"Fetch his horse? He is as mad as ever."
"I have my carriage here, Tresham. Ride in that. I'll go
and have it brought up."
"Stay where you are, Brougham. He is out of his mind."
"That's the fellow, Tresham. You show them what you are
made of, old sport."
"Fetch my damned horse!" Jocelyn spoke from between his
teeth. He had a death grip on the girl's shoulder.
"I am going to be very late," she scolded. "I will lose
my
employment for sure."
"And serve you right too," Jocelyn said, throwing her own
words back at her, his voice devoid of all sympathy as
his
friend strode away to bring his horse and the surgeon
launched into a protest.
"Silence, sir!" Jocelyn instructed him. "I will have my
own physician summoned to Dudley House. He will have more
regard for his future than to suggest sawing off my leg.
Help me to my horse, girl."