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NOW various rumours have, I know, got abroad concerning this affair. Whether my name has been connected with it or not I neither know nor care. But it is in the firm belief that nothing but good can come from a plain statement of the truth, that I am writing this.

I suppose, strictly speaking, Barstow could have refused to fight. Duelling is forbidden by the laws of England. But he was an obstinate fellow, and he certainly did not lack pluck. Moreover he felt, and it was a feeling one couldn't help admiring, that he owed it to the Baron to meet him.

The girl, poor child, was almost frantic with fear. And for some strange reason he wouldn't tell her what was in his mind. He adopted the line with her that he was no bad shot himself, and I followed his lead.

And it wasn't until he had said good-bye to her, and we were in the train, bound for Dalmatia that he told me.

(A certain uninhabited island off the Dalmatian coast was to be the scene of the duel.)

He had, of course, the choice of weapons, and when he first told me the terms on which he intended to fight I felt a momentary feeling of relief. But that feeling evaporated quickly. For what he proposed was certain death for one of them.

They were to fight with revolvers at a range of three feet. But only one revolver was to be loaded.

"I see it this way," he said to me. "I can't say that I want to risk my life on the spin of a coin. I can't say I want to fight this duel at all. But I've got to. I'm damned if I, an Englishman, am going to be found wanting in courage by any foreigner. If he refuses to fight on such terms, my responsibility ends. It will be he who is the coward."

"And if he doesn't refuse," I remarked.

"Then, old man, I'm going through with it," he said calmly. "One does a lot of funny things without thinking, Staunton. And though I should do just the same again over bolting with Eloise, I've got to face the music now."

Involuntarily I smiled at this repetition of my own thoughts.

"He is her husband, and there's not room for the two of us. But if he refuses to fight, then in his own parlance, honour is satisfied as far as I am concerned. Only one proviso do I make under those circumstances: he must swear to divorce Eloise."

And so I will come to the morning of the duel. The Marquis del Vittore was the Baron's second—an Italian who spoke English perfectly. We rowed out from the mainland in separate boats. Barstow and I arrived first and climbed a steep path up the cliff to a small level space on top. Then the others arrived, and I remember noticing at the time, subconsciously, a strange blueness round the Baron's lips, and his laboured breathing. But I was too excited to pay much attention to it.

Barstow was seated on a rock staring out to sea and smoking a cigarette, when I approached del Vittore.

"My first condition," I said, "is that your principal should swear on his honour to divorce his wife in the event of his refusing to fight."

The Marquis stared at me in amazement.

"Refusing to fight!" he said. "But that is what we've come here for."

"Nevertheless I must insist," I remarked.

He shrugged his shoulders and went over to the Baron, who also stared in amazement. And then he began to laugh—a nasty laugh. Barstow gazed at him quite unmoved.

"If I refuse to fight," sneered the Baron, "I will certainly swear to divorce my wife."

"Good," said George laconically, and once more looked out to sea.

"Then shall we discuss conditions, Monsieur," said del Vittore.

"The conditions have been settled by my principal," I remarked, "as he is entitled to do, being the challenged party. The duel will be fought with revolvers, at a range of three feet and only one revolver will be loaded."

The Marquis stared at me in silence: the Baron, every vestige of colour leaving his face, rose to his feet.

"Impossible," he said harshly. "It would be murder."

"Murder with the dice loaded equally," I remarked quietly.

And for a space there was silence. George had swung round and was staring at the Baron. He was outwardly calm, but I could see a pulse throbbing in his throat.

"These are the most extraordinary conditions," said the Italian.

"Possibly," I answered. "But in England, as you may know, we do not fight duels. My principal has no proficiency at all with a revolver. He fails therefore to see why he should do a thing which must result in his certain death: though he is quite prepared to run an even chance. His proposal gives no advantage to either side."

"I utterly refuse," cried the Baron harshly.

"Splendid!" said George. "Then the matter is ended. You have refused to fight, and I shall be obliged if you will start divorce proceedings as soon as possible."

And then occurred one of those little things that are so little and do so much. He smiled at me, an "I told you so" smile. And the Baron saw it.

"I have changed my mind," he said. "I will fight on those conditions."

And once again there was silence. George Barstow stood very still; I could feel my own heart going in great sickening thumps. And looking back on it now, I sometimes try to get the psychology of the thing. Did the Baron think he was calling a bluff: or did he simply accept the conditions in a moment of uncontrollable rage induced by that smile? What did Barstow himself think? For though he had never said so to me in so many words, I know that he had never anticipated that the Baron would fight. Hence the importance he had attached to his first condition.

And then suddenly the whole thing was changed. Impossible now, for anyone or anything to intervene. Barstow's conditions had been accepted: no man calling himself a man could back out. The Marquis drew me 'on one side.

"Can nothing be done?" he said. "This is not duelling: it is murder."

"So would the other have been," I answered.

And yet it seemed too utterly preposterous—a ghastly nightmare. In a minute, one of those two men would be dead. George, a little pale, but perfectly calm, was finishing his cigarette: the Baron, his face white as chalk, was walking up and down with stiff little steps. And suddenly I realised that it could not be—must not be.

Del Vittore, his hands shaking, took out the two revolvers. He handed me a round of ammunition, and then looked away.

"I don't even wish to know which revolver it is," he said. "Hand them both to me when you've finished."

I handed them to him, and then turned round.

"I will spin a coin," I said. "The Baron will call."

"Heads" he muttered.

"It's tails," I remarked. "Barstow, will you have the revolver in the Marquis's right hand or in his left?"

He flung away his cigarette.

"Right," he said laconically.

I handed it to him, and del Vittore gave the other to the Baron. Then we placed the two men facing one another.

And suddenly del Vittore lost his nerve.

"Get it over!" he shouted. "For God's sake get it over!"

There came a click: the Baron had fired. His revolver was not the loaded one. For a moment he stood there, while the full realisation of what it meant came to him. Then he gave a strangled scream of fear, and his hand went to his heart. His knees sagged suddenly and he collapsed and lay still.

"What's the matter with him?" muttered Barstow. "I haven't fired."

"He's dead," said del Vittore stupidly. "His heart—Weak..."

George Barstow flung his revolver away.

"Thank God! I didn't fire," he said hoarsely. And silence fell on us save for the discordant screaming of the gulls.

"The result of the exertion of climbing," said del Vittore after a while. "That's what we must say. And we must unload that revolver."

"There's no need," I said slowly. "It was never loaded. Neither of them were."