Читать книгу The Free Lances - Майн Рид - Страница 12

The thick “swamp-fog” still hovered above the Crescent City, when a carriage, drawn by two horses, rolled out through one of its suburbs, and on along the Shell Road, and in the direction of Lake Pontchartrain.

It was a close carriage—a hackney—with two men upon the driver’s seat, and three inside. Of these last, one was Captain Florence Kearney, and another Lieutenant Francis Crittenden, both officers of the filibustering band, with titles not two days old. Now on the way neither to Texas nor Mexico, but to the shore of Lake Pontchartrain, where many an affair of honour has been settled by the spilling of much blood. A stranger in New Orleans, and knowing scarce a soul, Kearney had bethought him of the young fellow who had been elected first-lieutenant, and asked him to act as his second. Crittenden, a Kentuckian, being one of those who could not only stand fire, but eat it, if the occasion called, eagerly responded to the appeal; and they were now en route along the Shell Road to meet Carlos Santander and whoever he might have with him.

The third individual inside the carriage belonged to that profession, one of whose members usually makes the third in a duel—the doctor. He was a young man who, in the capacity of surgeon, had attached himself to the band of filibusters.

Besides the mahogany box balanced upon his thigh there was another lying on the spare bit of cushion beside him, opposite to where Crittenden sat. It was of a somewhat different shape; and no one who had ever seen a case of duelling pistols could mistake it for aught else—for it was such.

As it had been arranged that swords were to be the weapons, and a pair of these were seen in a corner of the carriage, what could they be wanting with pistols?

It was Kearney who put this question; now for the first time noticing what seemed to him a superfluous armament. It was asked of Crittenden, to whom the pistols belonged, as might have been learnt by looking at his name engraved on the indented silver plate.

“Well,” answered the Kentuckian, “I’m no great swordsman myself. I usually prefer pistols, and thought it might be as well to bring a pair along. I didn’t much like the look of your antagonist’s friend, and it’s got into my head that before leaving the ground I may have something to say to him on my own account. So, if it come to that, I shall take to the barkers.”

Kearney smiled, but said nothing, feeling satisfied that in case of any treachery, he had the right sort of man for his second.

He might have felt further secure, in a still other supporting party, who rode on the box beside the driver. This was a man carrying a long rifle, that stood with the barrel two feet above his shoulders, and the butt rested between his heavily booted feet.

It was Cris Rock, who had insisted on coming along, as he said, to see that the fight was all “fair and square.” He too had conceived an unfavourable opinion of both the men to be met, from what he had seen of them at the rendezvous; for Santander’s second had also been there. With the usual caution of one accustomed to fighting Indians, he always went armed, usually with his long “pea” rifle.

On reaching a spot of open ground alongside the road, and near the shore of the lake, the carriage stopped. It was the place of the appointed meeting, as arranged by the seconds on the preceding day.

Though their antagonists had not yet arrived, Kearney and Crittenden got out, leaving the young surgeon busied with his cutlery and bandage apparatus.

“I hope you won’t have to use them, doctor,” remarked Kearney, with a light laugh, as he sprang out of the carriage. “I don’t want you to practise upon me till we’ve made conquest of Mexico.”

“And not then, I trust,” soberly responded the surgeon.

Crittenden followed, carrying the swords; and the two, leaping across the drain which separated the road from the duelling ground, took stand under a tree.

Rock remained firm on the coach-box, still seated and silent. As the field was full under his view, and within range of his rifle, he knew that, like the doctor, he would be near enough if wanted.

Ten minutes passed—most of the time in solemn silence, on the part of the principal, with some anxious thoughts. No matter how courageous a man may be—however skilled in weapons, or accustomed to the deadly use of them—he cannot, at such a crisis, help having a certain tremor of the heart, if not a misgiving of conscience. He has come there to kill, or be killed; and the thought of either should be sufficient to disturb mental equanimity. At such times, he who is not gifted with natural courage had needs have a good cause, and confidence in the weapon to be used. Florence Kearney possessed all three; and though it was his first appearance in a duel, he had no fear for the result. Even the still, sombre scene, with the long grey moss hanging down from the dark cypress trees, like the drapery of a hearse, failed to inspire him with dread. If, at times, a slight nervousness came over him, it was instantly driven off by the thought of the insult he had received—and, perhaps also, a little by the remembrance of those dark eyes he fancied would flash proudly if he triumphed, and weep bitterly were he to suffer discomfiture. Very different were his feelings now from those he experienced less than forty-eight hours before, when he was on his way to the house of Don Ignacio Valverde. That night, before leaving it, he was good as sure he possessed the heart of Don Ignacio’s daughter. Indeed, she had all but told him so; and was this not enough to nerve him for the encounter near at hand?

Very near now—close to commencing. The rumbling of wheels heard through the drooping festoonery of the trees, proclaimed that a second carriage was approaching along the Shell Road. It could only be that containing the antagonists. And it was that. In less than ten minutes after, it drew up on the causeway, about twenty paces to the rear of the one already arrived. Two men got out, who, although wrapped in cloaks and looking as large as giants through the thick mist, could be recognised as Carlos Santander and his second. There was a third individual, who, like the young surgeon, remained by the carriage—no doubt a doctor, too—making the duelling party symmetrical and complete.

Santander and his friend having pulled off their cloaks and tossed them back into the carriage, turned towards the wet ditch, and also leaped over it.

The first performed the feat somewhat awkwardly, drooping down upon the further bank with a ponderous thud. He was a large, heavily built man—altogether unlike one possessing the activity necessary for a good swordsman.

His antagonist might have augured well from his apparent clumsiness, but for what he had heard of him. For Carlos Santander, though having the repute of a swaggerer, with some suspicion of cowardice, had proved himself a dangerous adversary by twice killing his man. His second—a French-Creole, called Duperon—enjoyed a similar reputation, he, too, having been several times engaged in affairs that resulted fatally. At this period New Orleans was emphatically the city of the duello—for this speciality, perhaps the most noted in the world.

As already said, Florence Kearney knew the sort of man he had to meet, and this being his own first appearance in a duelling field, he might well have been excused for feeling some anxiety as to the result. It was so slight, however, as not to betray itself, either in his looks or gestures. Confiding in his skill, gained by many a set-to with buttoned foils, and supported, as he was, by the gallant young Kentuckian, he knew nothing that could be called fear. Instead, as his antagonist advanced towards the spot where he was standing, and he looked at the handsome, yet sinister face—his thoughts at the same time reverting to Luisa Valverde, and the insult upon him in her presence—his nerves, not at all unsteady, now became firm as steel. Indeed, the self-confident, almost jaunty air, with which his adversary came upon the ground, so far from shaking them—the effect, no doubt, intended—but braced them the more.

When the new-comers had advanced a certain distance into the meadow, Crittenden, forsaking his stand under the tree, stepped out to meet them, Kearney following a few paces behind.

A sort of quadruple bow was the exchanged salutation; then the principals remained apart, the seconds drawing nigher to one another, and entering upon the required conference.

Only a few words passed between them, as but few were required; the weapons, distance, and mode of giving the word, having all been pre-arranged.

There was no talk of apology—nor thought of it being either offered or accepted. By their attitude, and in their looks, both the challenged and challenger showed a full, firm determination to fight.

Duperon did not seem to care much one way or the other, and the Kentuckian was not the sort to seek conciliation—with an insult such as his captain had received calling for chastisement.

After the preliminaries were passed over, the seconds again separated—each to attend upon his principal.

The young Irishman took off his coat, and rolled back his shirt sleeves up to the elbow. Santander, on the other hand, who wore a red flannel shirt under his ample sacque, simply threw aside the latter, leaving the shirt sleeves as they were, buttoned around the wrist.

Everybody was now silent; the hackney-drivers on their boxes, the doctors, the gigantic Texan, all looming large and spectral-like through the still lingering mist, while the streamers of Spanish moss hanging from the cypresses around were appropriate drapery for such a scene.

In the midst of the death-like silence a voice broke in, coming from the top of a tall cypress standing near. Strange and wild, it was enough not only to startle, but awe the stoutest heart. A shrill, continued cachinnation, which, though human-like, could scarce be ascribed to aught human, save the laughter of a maniac.

It frightened no one there, all knowing what it was—the cackling cry of the white-headed eagle.

As it ended, but before its echoes had ceased reverberating among the trees, another sound, equally awe-inspiring, woke the echoes of the forest further down. This, the whoo-whoo-whooa of the great southern owl, seemingly a groan in answer to the eagle’s laugh.

In all countries, and throughout all ages, the hooting of the owl has been superstitiously dreaded as ominous of death, and might have dismayed our duellists, had they been men of the common kind of courage. Neither were, or seemed not to be; for, as the lugubrious notes were still echoing in their ears, they advanced, and with rapiers upraised, stood confronting each other, but one look on their faces, and one thought in their hearts—“to kill!”