I wished to get the fullest measure of his skill, however, and for this reason did not attempt to touch him for some minutes. Then an idea occurred to me. I would prove to the men with us that I had no real wish to avoid the fight. Intentionally I let my adversary touch my left arm, drawing a little blood.

They stopped us instantly; and then came the question whether enough had been done to satisfy the demands of honour. Had I chosen, I could without actual cowardice have declared the thing finished: but I intended them all to understand that I had to the full as keen an appet.i.te as my opponent for the business. I was peremptory therefore in my demand to go on.

In the pause I made my plan. I would cover my adversary with ridicule by outfencing him at all points: play with him, in fact; and give him a hundred little skin wounds to shew him and the rest how completely he had been at my mercy.

I did it with consummate ease. My sword point played round him as an electric spark will dart about a magnet, and he was like a child in his feeble efforts to follow its dazzling swiftness. Scarcely had we engaged before I had flicked a piece of skin from his cheek. The next time it was from his sword arm. Then from his neck, and after that from his other cheek; until there was no part of his flesh in view which had not a drop of blood to mark that my sword point had been there. The man was mad with baffled and impotent rage.

Then I put an end to it. After the last rest I put the whole of my energy and skill into my play, and pressed him so hard that any one of the onlookers could see I could have run him through the heart half a dozen times: and at the end of it I disarmed him with a wrench that was like to break his wrist.

To do the man justice, he had pluck. He made sure I meant to kill him, but he faced me resolutely enough when I raised my sword and put the point right at his heart.

"One word," said I, sternly. "I have put this indignity on you because of the insolent message you sent to me by Lieutenant Essaieff. But for that I would simply have disarmed you at once and made an end of the thing. Now, remember me by this...." I raised my sword and struck him with the flat side of it across the face, leaving an ugly red trail.

Then I turned on my heel and went to where my seconds stood, lost in staring amazement at what I had done. I put on my clothes in silence; and as I glanced about me I saw that the scene had created a powerful impression upon everybody present.

All men are irresistibly influenced by skill such as I had shewn under circ.u.mstances of the kind; and the utter humbling of a bully who had ridden rough-shod over the whole regiment was agreeable enough now that it had been accomplished. My own evil character was forgotten in the fact that I had beaten the man who had beaten everybody else and traded on his deadly reputation.

Lieutenant Essaieff came to me as I was turning to leave the place alone. He gave me back the letter I had entrusted to him, and after a momentary hesitation, said:--

"Petrovitch, I did you an injustice, and I am sorry for it. I thought you were afraid, and I had no idea that you had anything like such pluck and skill. I believed you were bl.u.s.tering; and I apologise to you for the way in which I brought Devinsky's message. But for what happened last night in your rooms"--and he drew himself up as he spoke--"I am at your service if you desire it."

"I'd much rather breakfast than fight with you to-morrow morning, Essaieff, if you won't think me a coward for crying off the encounter."

"After this morning no one will ever call you a coward;" said he; and I think he was a good deal relieved at not having to stand in front of a sword which could do what mine had just done. "Shall we drive back together?"

We saluted the others ceremoniously, my late antagonist scowling very angrily as he made an abrupt and formal gesture. Then I snubbed Gradinsk, who looked very white, remembering what I had said to him when driving to the ground; and Lieutenant Essaieff and I left together.

"How is it we have all been so mistaken in you, Petrovitch?" asked my companion when we had lighted our cigarettes.

"How is it that I have been so mistaken in you?" I retorted. "I chose to take my own way, that's all. I wished to know the relish of the reputation for cowardice, if you like. I have never been out before in Moscow, as you know; and have never had to shew what I could do with either sword or pistol. Nor did I seek this quarrel. But because I have never fought till I was compelled, that does not mean that I can't fight when I am compelled. But the truth's out now, and it may as well all be known. Come to my rooms for five minutes before breakfast--I am going to my sister's to breakfast--and I'll shew you what I can do with the pistols. It may prevent anyone making the mistake of choosing those should there be any more of this morning's work to do."

"I hope you can keep your head," he said, after a pause. "You'll be about the most popular man in the whole regiment after to-day's business. I don't believe there's a more hated man in the whole city than Devinsky; and everyone's sure to love you for making him bite the dust. I suppose you're coming to the ball at the Zemliczka Palace to-night. You'll be the lion."

There was a touch of envy in his voice, I think, and he smiled when I answered indifferently that I had not decided. As a fact I didn't know whether I had any invitation or not, so that my indifference was by no means feigned.

When we reached my rooms I took him in and as I wished to noise abroad so far as possible the fact of my skill with weapons, I shewed him some of the trick shots I had learnt. Pistol shooting had been with me, as I have said, quite a pa.s.sion at one time and I had practised until I could hit anything within range, either stationary or moving. More than that, I was an expert in the reflection shot--shooting over my shoulder at a mark I could see reflected in a mirror held in front of me. Indeed there was scarcely a trick with the pistol which I did not know and had not practised.

The lieutenant had not words enough to express his amazement and admiration; and when I sent him away after about a quarter of an hour's shooting such as he had never seen, he was reduced to a condition of speechless wonder.

Then I dressed carefully, having bathed and attended to the light wound on my arm, and set out to relieve my "sister's" suspense and keep my appointment for breakfast. I found myself thinking pleasantly of the pretty, kindly little face of the girl, and when I saw a light of infinite relief and gladness sparkle in her eyes at sight of me safe and sound and punctual, I experienced a much more gratifying sensation than I had expected.

Her face was somewhat white and drawn and her eyes hollow, telling of a sleepless, anxious night; and she grasped my hand so warmly and was so moved, that I could not fail to see that she had been worrying lest trouble had come to me through her action of the previous day.

"You haven't had so much sleep as I have, Olga," I said, lightly.

"Are you really safe, quite safe, and unhurt? And have you really been mad enough to go out and fight that man? Oh, I could not sleep a wink all night for thinking of you and of the cruel gleam I have seen in his eyes." And she covered her face with her hands and shivered.

"Getting up early in the morning always gives me an unconscionable appet.i.te, Olga. I thought you knew that," said I lightly and with a laugh. "But I see no breakfast; and that's hardly sisterly, you know."

"It's all in the next room ready," she answered, leading the way. "But tell me the news:" and her face was all aglow with eager inquiry.

"I had no difficulty with Major Devinsky. As I antic.i.p.ated he was no sort of a match for me at that business. I'm not bragging, but I've been trained in a totally different school, and--well, the beggar never had a chance."

She smiled then, and her eyes danced in gladness, but as suddenly grew grave again. Wonderfully tell-tale eyes they were!

"What about--I mean--is he hurt?"

"No, not much. Nothing serious. His quarrel wasn't with me, you see, so I couldn't kill him or wound him seriously. But you'll hear probably from others what happened."

"I want to hear from you, please. You promised the news at first hand remember."

"Well, I played rather a melodrama, I fear. I managed to snick him in a number of places till he's pitted a good deal. I gave him a lesson for having treated you in that way and also for his insolence to me.

Besides I wished to make a bit of an impression on the other men there.

He won't trouble us again, I fancy."

"He's dangerous, Alexis: mind that. Very dangerous. But oh, I'm so glad it's all over and you're safe and sound--And here's your favourite dish--though you don't know what it is."

"I don't care what it is. I'll take whatever you give me on trust."

At that she glanced at me and coloured, and hung her head.

She was very pretty indeed when the colour glowed in her cheeks, and as a rather long silence followed I had plenty of time to observe her.

She made a most captivating little hostess, too; and I began to feel that if I had had a sister of my own like her, I should have been remarkably fond of her, and perhaps--who can tell?--a very different man myself.

"By the way, there's one thing you must be careful to say," I said, breaking a long pause that was getting embarra.s.sing. "You will probably be asked whether you knew that I was an expert with the sword and pistol and was purposely concealing my skill from the men here in Moscow. That's what I've said, and it may be as well that you should seem to have known it. A brother and sister should have no secrets from each other, you know."

She shook her head at me and, with a smile and in a tone of mock reproach, said:

"You haven't always thought that, Alexis."

"It's never too late to mend," returned I. "And I'll promise for the future, if you like--so long as the relationship lasts, that is."

To that she made no answer, and when she spoke again she had changed the subject.

We chatted very pleasantly during breakfast, and I asked her presently about the dance at the Zemliczka Palace. She was going to it, she said, and told me that I had also accepted.

"Can a brother and sister dance together, Olga," I asked.

"I don't know," she replied, playing with the point as though it were some grave matter of diplomacy. "I have never had to consider the question practically because you have never asked me, Alexis. But I think they might sit out together," and with the laugh that accompanied that sentence ringing in my ears, like the refrain of a sweet song, we parted to meet again at the ball.

CHAPTER V.

GETTING DEEPER.

The news that I had beaten Devinsky, had played with him like a cat with a bird, spread like a forest fire. Essaieff was right enough in his forecast that everyone would be delighted at the major's overthrow.

But the notoriety which the achievement brought me was not at all unlikely to prove a source of embarra.s.sment.