"Now to come to the point," pursued their tormentor, his fierce eyes in singular contrast to his bald head and deliberate speech, "the present Duke of Salolja--to keep the discussion conveniently impersonal--has made up his mind to contract an alliance with a certain English lady; a commoner, it is true, but one whose beauty and wealth may claim to make up, in a measure, for genealogical deficiencies. The lady's name is Miss Ulrica Buffkin."

Both hearers nodded an acquaintance with it.

"It has come to the duke's knowledge," continued that same n.o.bleman, raising his tone to a slightly minatory pitch. "That another person, an Englishman, I should say an English n.o.bleman, has, unwittingly I am ready to allow, been led into paying certain attentions to the lady in question. I am sure that to capable and clever men like yourselves it is not necessary for me to set myself the disagreeable task of pointing out the inevitable result of such an unwarranted and deplorable interference should it be persevered in."

He paused, took out a silk pocket-handkerchief embroidered with a flamboyant coronet and cypher, and pa.s.sed it lightly across his lips, never taking his vicious eyes off the two men who had by this, under the paralysing gaze, a.s.sumed the appearance and almost the condition of a pair of waxworks.

As the lengthening pause seemed to demand a response, Gage with a great effort roused himself from the Tussaudy rigidity, and, with a desperate attempt at boldness, replied--

"You might let us know, while we are on the subject."

"No harm in mentioning it," Peckover chipped in with a somewhat ghastly pretence of a smile.

The little duke thrust back the handkerchief into his breast pocket, and then threw out his hands expressively. "I should have imagined,"

he replied, with a transcendentally threatening eye, "that men of the sagacity and penetration of your graces would have found no difficulty in deducing from the instances you have just heard with such admirable patience, the fate in store for any one who is rash enough to enter the lists with a Duke of Salolja."

His voice, rising with abrupt suddenness, thundered out the last words with a volume and intensity which made his rivals fairly jump in their uneasy seats. Anyhow, the wordy Grandee had come to the point, and the point had to be faced or run from.

Gage, whose mode of life had kept his nervous system in better order than his companion's, was the first to reply.

"That's all very well," he said, bracing himself to join issue with the fiery little Castilian, and a.s.suming a courage he did not feel. "But this is a free country; and in these enlightened days you can't run a man through the body before lunch because your best girl has the good or bad taste to prefer him."

Fury leapt like a flame in the duke's eyes, but he replied calmly, even suavely, "Your excellency is wrong. What is to prevent me?"

"The police," Peckover suggested promptly, trying to catch boldness from Gage's att.i.tude.

The duke burst into a loud and particularly unpleasant laugh. "The police? Really, your graces compel my amus.e.m.e.nt. May I ask you three questions?"

"Three dozen, if you like," answered Gage unsteadily.

The duke accepted the bounty with a bow. "Three will suffice."

Whereupon very loudly, "One." Then in a normal tone, "How many police have you within a radius of, say, three miles from Staplewick Towers?"

"One or two," Gage was forced to answer rather sheepishly.

The duke bowed, this time with a sarcastic smile.

"Two." Again the disturbing, superfluous shout. "How long would it take you to send for the nearest, supposing you found him at home?"

"Oh, about twenty minutes," Gage tried to reply casually.

Once more the absurdly loud enumeration. "Three. And how long do you consider it would take me to put a bullet through your body?"

Simultaneously with the question a glittering object shone in his hand.

It was the highly polished barrel of a revolver which he had whipped out casually with a deftness which seemed born of practice, and with which he now covered his rival.

Both men started to their feet with blanched faces.

"Here, I say!" Peckover remonstrated in ill-concealed terror.

"How long?" sang out the little demon of a duke in his commanding voice. "Oblige me by answering the question."

"A second, I suppose," gasped Gage. "Now please turn that revolver away."

"That is," proceeded the duke in a tone of satisfaction, "nineteen minutes and fifty-nine seconds before the policeman arrives." Still holding the weapon in his hand, but now pointing to the floor, he rose, brought his heels together and bowed. "I trust, milord Quorn and Mr.

Gage, my most honourable friends, that at length we understand one another." Then he sat down again, his aggressive eyes moving with mechanical regularity from one man to the other, since the exigencies of the moment had sent the friends apart.

But now, throughly roused by the critical situation, Peckover spoke.

"I don't know, my lord dook, whether you are aware that we have strict laws in this country against murder."

"And," put in Gage, "against carrying firearms without a licence."

The duke laughed scornfully and with superfluous volume. "Do your Excellencies think we have no such laws in Spain? And do your graces suppose that if the Dukes of Salolja had cared a fig for them the occurrences which I have narrated to you would have happened? You hang a man for what you call murder here. But have you ever heard of your English law hanging a Grandee of Spain? And do you think you would be allowed to do so? Pah!" He snapped his fingers with a noise like the crack of a whip. "What is your English law compared with the immemorial traditions of the Saloljas? NOTHING! Shall it stand between a Salolja and his vengeance, his desire? NEVER!"

He shouted the answers to the last two of his many questions with scornful vehemence. His manner was, no doubt, irritating, and that, perhaps, accounted for Peckover's boldness.

"You don't bluff us you are above the law," he said, trembling at his own temerity. "If we haven't hung a Spanish Grandee as yet, it's because none of you have killed anybody over here that I remember."

The demon duke grinned and spread out his hands before him, as though sweeping away a feeble protest.

"My gracious friend, you jump at hasty conclusions. Who talks of killing, of murder. Faugh! It is a vulgar word. Accidents happen, here as in Spain; deplorable, fatal accidents. Firearms go off, almost of themselves; it is sad to think how easily they go off. I could tell you stories of such miserable fatalities in my own family, but you have probably heard enough of the ways of the Saloljas for one evening.

Death is very near us always," he continued sententiously. "So near that the healthiest of us is only just alive. Which of us bears a life worth an hour's purchase? NONE! And the man who trifles with a Salolja cannot call the next moment his own. There it is. Accept it or not, it is the truth, the eternal, bitter, naked truth."

His voice was like a Nasmyth hammer, now pounding, roaring, seeming to shake the room, now gentle and soft as a shy schoolgirl's. As he concluded his speech his tone sank into a solemn hush, indicative of the awesome inevitable. For some moments there was silence in the room, save for the ticking clock. Then, when the tension had lasted as long as was desirable, the duke rose, and advancing to the table took the finest peach in the dish. The flashing had now faded from his eyes, and the expression on his face was truculently amiable.

"I sincerely hope I have not wearied your excellencies," he observed.

"It has been most condescending and gracious of you to let me explain myself at such length. A veritable poem of a peach; I have not met its fellow in England. May I now, since our slight misunderstanding is at an end, do myself the honour of drinking a gla.s.s of wine with your graces?"

Rousing themselves from the gloomy preoccupation of their discomfiture, their graces, with a quite futile pretence of ease, hastened to minister to their undesirable visitor's request. That worthy proceeded to toss off a couple of b.u.mpers with a relish commensurate with his long and thirst-giving harangue. "If I ask further for one of your graces' excellent cigars," he suggested with a pleasantness which could not seem other than grim, "it is as another proof of how unwilling I am to bear malice. Ah!" He lighted the cigar and blew out a long cloud with evident enjoyment.

"Unlike my ancestors I make allowances," he declared significantly.

"Unlike them again, I never strike without warning. Yes," he added, dropping his voice into a genial tone; "it is perhaps well for us that we did not live, and in the same relations one to another, a hundred, two hundred years ago. At least we should not all three be enjoying these superb cigars."

It was a difficult sentiment for the smarting pair to respond to.

"Just so," was all Peckover, with an awkward laugh, could think of.

"I am ashamed to have stayed so long," said their guest, with an expressive glance at the clock. "But it is better to risk missing the strict punctilio than to have to intrude again. Your excellency's house and park are delightful. I felicitate myself on my visit. Your cigars are exquisite. I take another, in token of our better understanding, to enjoy on my way to your somewhat depressing Great Bunbury. Good-night, milord Quorn. Good-night, Mr. Gage. A thousand compliments and adieux to you both. May it never be necessary for us to meet on less amicable terms than those which prevail between us at present. Once again my most distinguished homage. Adieu."

With his heels together he made to each man a most profound bow; then turned to the window, opened it with a sure touch upon the latch, turned again, bowed, and disappeared into the night.

For some moments the two men stood staring speechless into the darkness. Then their eyes met.

"This is a glorious t.i.tle," said Gage, clipping out the words with bitter intensity. "I am having a ripping time with it. It's a fine thing to be alive just now."

"All things considered, it's lucky we are alive," was Peckover's dry but feeling response.