“To encounter Monsieur the Chevalier,” replied Florian, with quite as sweet a stateliness, but feeling rather like a bantam cock beside this big Raoul, “is always a privilege.”
People everywhere were listening now: this gambit hardly seemed fraternal. The well-bred elderly friends of Monsieur de Brancas, to be sure, made a considerate pretence at going on with their talk, but most of the scented and painted boys had betrayed their lower social degree by gaping openly: and Florian knew he was in for an unpleasant business.
“—For I am wondering if you have heard, monsieur,” the Chevalier went on, “that the Comte d’Arnaye has spread the report that at Madame de Nesle’s last ball I appeared with two buttons missing from my waistcoat?”
“I really cannot answer for the truth of such gossip, monsieur,”—thus Florian, with high civility,—“since I have not seen my uncle for some time.”
“Ah, ah! so the Comte d’Arnaye is your uncle!” Raoul seemed gravely pleased. “That is excellent, for, inasmuch as I cannot readily obtain satisfaction for this calumny from your uncle, who has retired into the provinces for the winter, I can apply to you.”
Florian said, with careful patience: “I am delighted, monsieur, to act as his representative. In that capacity I can assure you whoever asserted Monsieur d’Arnaye declared the waistcoat in which you attended the last ball of Madame de Nesle to be deficient in two buttons, or in one button, or in a half-stitch of thread, has told a lie.”
Raoul de Puysange frowned. “Diantre! it was my own cousin, the Count’s youngest son, who was my informant; and since my cousin, monsieur, as you are well aware, is little more than a child—”
“You should have the less trouble, then,” said Florian, vexed by his brother’s pertinacity, “in horsewhipping the brat for his silly falsehood.”
“Come, Monsieur the Duke, but I cannot have my cousin called a liar, far less listen to this talk of horsewhipping one who is of my blood. I must ask satisfaction for these affronts, and I will send a friend to wait upon you.”
Florian looked sadly at his brother. But the Duc de Puysange shrugged before a meddlesome and quite unimportant person.
Florian answered: “I am well content, Monsieur the Chevalier. Only, to save time, I would suggest that your friend go direct to the Vicomte de Lautrec, since he is here to-night, and since I have promised him that he should second me in my next affair.”
The two brothers bowed and parted decorously, having thus arranged a public quarrel in which Mademoiselle de Nerac was in no way involved. The instant’s tension was over, and the guests of Monsieur de Brancas thronged hastily through the corridor,—which was rather chilly, because all the outer side of this corridor was builded of stained glass,—and went into the little private theatre, where the fiddles were already tuning for the overture of a new and tuneful burletta that dealt with The Fall of Sodom. The curtain by and by rose on the civic revels, and the rest of the evening passed merrily.
After the first act, while the scenery was being shifted so as to represent Lot’s cave in the mountains, all details of the fraternal duel were arranged by Messieurs de Lautrec and de Soyecourt. Tall lean Monsieur de Soyecourt had, as a cousin, been prompt to insist upon his right to act for Raoul in an encounter so sure to be discussed everywhere. Shortly after midnight,—at which hour the other guests of Monsieur de Brancas went into the Salon des Flagellants to amuse themselves at a then very fashionable game which you played with little whips,—the two brothers left the hotel with their seconds. A surgeon had been sent for, and he accompanied them and the five girls, whom the Vicomte de Lautrec had caused to be fetched from La Fillon’s, to a house near the Port Maillot, where all indulged in various pleasantries until morning.
The wine here proved so good, the girls were so amiable and accomplished, that by daylight Florian had mellowed into an all-embracing benevolence, and he proposed to compound the affair. The suggestion roused an almost angry buzz of protest.
Lautrec was demanding, of the company at large, would you have me, who was married only last week, staying out all night, with no better excuse than that I was drunk with these charming girls? Why, I was committed to three rendezvous last night, and if there be no duel I shall have trouble with a trio of ladies of the highest fashion. Nor is it, put in the Marquis de Soyecourt,—whose speaking was always somewhat indistinct, because of the loss of all his upper front-teeth,—nor is it kind of you, my dear, to wish to deprive us of taking part in a business which will make so much noise in the world: brothers do not fight every day, this affair will be talked about. I quite agree with Lautrec that your whim is foolish and inconsiderate. Besides, Raoul was saying reprovingly, the honor of our house is involved. To have a Puysange cry off from a duel would be a reflection upon our blood that I could not endure—
“What is honor,” replied Florian, “to the love which has been between us?”
The Chevalier looked half-shocked at this sort of talk: but he only answered that Hannibal and Agamemnon had been very pretty fellows in their day while it lasted; so too the boys who had loved each other at Storisende and Bellegarde. Let the dead rest. No, to go back now was impossible, without creating a deal of adverse comment, in view of the publicity of their quarrel.
Florian sighed, half wearied, half vexed, by the remote sound of his brother’s talking, and he replied: “That is true. One must be logical. You three are better advised than I, and we dare not offend against the notions of our neighbors.”
The gentlemen went into the park. They walked toward the old Chateau de Madrid. There had been a very light fall of snow. It felt like sand underfoot as you walked. Florian reflected it was droll that oak-trees should retain so many bronze leaves thus late in winter. They quite overshadowed this place, and made the snow look bluish.
The gentlemen prepared for their duel, each of the four being armed with two pistols and a sword. When all was ready, Raoul fired at once, and wounded Florian in the left arm. It hurt. The little brother whose face was always grimy would never have hurt you.
At Florian’s side Lautrec had fallen, dead. The bullet of the Marquis de Soyecourt had by an incredible chance struck the Vicomte full in the right eye, piercing the brain.
“Name of a name!” observed the Marquis, who was unwounded, “but here is another widow to be consoled,—when I had aimed too at his ear! That is the devil of this carousing all night, and then coming to one’s duels with shaken nerves. But how fare our sons of Oedipus?”
The Marquis turned, and what he saw was sufficiently curious.
Florian had winced when hit, thus for an instant spoiling his aim, but he at once lowered his pistol, and he shot this tall man who had nothing to do with his little brother, neatly through the breast. Raoul de Puysange fired wildly with his second pistol, and drew his sword as if to rush upon Florian, who merely shifted the yet loaded pistol to his uncrippled right hand, and waited. But Raoul had not advanced two paces when Raoul fell.
Florian dropped the undischarged pistol, and went to his brother. This thin snow underfoot was like scattered sand, and your treading in it was audible.
“You have done for me, my dear,” declared the Chevalier.
And Florian was perturbed. He wished, for all that his arm was hurting him confoundedly, to reply whatever in the circumstances was the correct thing, but he could think of no exact precedent. So he put aside the wild fancy of responding, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” and to this stranger at his feet he said, with a quite admirable tremor wherein anguish blended nicely with a manly self-restraint: “Raoul, you are the happier of us two. Do you forgive me?”
“Yes,” replied the other, “I forgive you.” Raoul gazed up fondly at his brother. Raoul said, with that genius for the obviously appropriate which Florian always envied, “I feel for you as I know you do for me.”