CHAPTER II.

“When honour is a support to virtuous principles, and runs parallel with the laws of God and our country, it cannot be too much cherished and encouraged; but when the dictates of honour are contrary to those of religion and equity, they are the greatest depravations of human nature, by giving wrong, ambitious, and false ideas of what is good and laudable, and should therefore be exploded by every good government, and driven out as the bane and plague of human society.”

ADDISON.

Frank Warenne alone was not deceived, and could not doubt that his brother would resent the insult which he had received. He knew too well Warenne’s delicate sense of honour; and, recognising in the tranquillity of his demeanour the settled calmness of decision, he intuitively guessed the truth. Want of fraternal affection was not one of Frank’s failings, and he sought his chamber in a state of serious disquietude. He saw no means by which a rencontre could be prevented, nor any by which he might transfer to his own person the danger that threatened him he loved so dearly. He felt that honour, according to military custom, demanded from Warenne himself that he should require an apology from O’Neil; that in all probability O’Neil would not apologize; and they must therefore necessarily meet each other. He could not rest—he did not even attempt to lie down, but paced his room in restless anxiety hour after hour, forming a thousand different schemes to ensure his brother’s safety, yet unable to find one which should not compromise his fame. At last, about five o’clock, resolving to ascertain whether his fears were well founded, he stole across the passage to the door of Warenne’s room, and gently opened it. Warenne was writing, but started up at Frank’s entrance.

“Is it you, Frank!” he exclaimed.

“Forgive me, Gerald,” rejoined Frank, “but I am certain you are going to fight that scoundrel O’Neil, and I am wretched about it: I have passed the whole night in utter misery. Gerald! this may be our last meeting,” and as he spoke he flung himself upon his brother’s neck.

“Do not unman me,” said Warenne; “just at this moment I have need of all my firmness, for I will not deny your conclusion with respect to O’Neil. Would that I could! for I abhor duelling from my soul. I cannot disguise from myself that it is a wicked and abominable practice, expressly contrary to the law of Him, in whom, notwithstanding the irregularities of my soldier’s life, I most sincerely trust,—if I may dare to say so in such an hour as this; neither can I forget that I am perhaps about to appear before him with the crime of murder, in intention at least, upon my soul. Still I have not the moral courage to break through custom, when the alternative is disgrace—but I must not think of these matters now. Let us talk of something else, Frank—I had just finished a letter to you as you came in, which I meant should be delivered to you in case I fell;—put it in your pocket, and return it to me, if all goes well—nay, do not read it. It contains only a few words of advice from your old Mentor, who would fain have you do justice to his instructions, and to yourself.”

As he proceeded, Warenne regained his habitual self-command, and Frank, his mind unconsciously imbibing a portion of his brother’s calmness, became more tranquil. They talked on with composure, and even cheerfulness, of the future prospects of the latter. It was now six o’clock, and Warenne begged Frank to leave him to a few minutes repose. The sad conviction that this might be their last interview once more forced itself on the mind of the latter, and he would have relieved his bursting heart by tears, had he not feared to give pain to one he loved better than himself. He lingered for a while on his brother’s neck, pressed him yet closer to his heart, then invoking every blessing upon his head, and receiving from him a fond but solemn benediction in return, he rushed to his own chamber, where he threw himself on his bed, and, after a few minutes, fairly sobbed himself to sleep.

About a quarter before seven Stuart knocked at Warenne’s door, with the intelligence that O’Neil would not apologise. Nothing remained therefore to be done but to proceed to the meeting, and in a few minutes the two friends were on the road to a sequestered spot a short distance from the town, which Stuart and O’Neil’s second had selected. It is not necessary to relate the particulars of a duel; suffice it to say, that the affair was properly conducted, and that O’Neil fell at the first fire, severely, but not dangerously, wounded; while Warenne received his antagonist’s ball in the fleshy part of his right arm, just above the elbow. As soon as the latter saw the effect of his fire he ran up to O’Neil, and endeavoured as well as he could to raise him up, with a feeling of anguish he alone can estimate who finds himself with blood upon his hand, shed, not under excitement, nor in a moment of passion, but coolly and unnecessarily, in compliance with the customs of the world. Nor was his distress alleviated, when as he waited with impatience the opinion of the surgeon on the nature and extent of the injury he had inflicted, the wounded man took his hand and said—

“If I die, I forgive you; my own folly has been the cause of my death.”

He could have cursed himself for his crime. His suspense, however, lasted not long. The surgeon, after an accurate examination into the direction of the ball, pronounced that no vital part was injured, and that “Mr. O’Neil would be as sound a man as ever in three months.”

Never did sounds of sweetest melody fall so pleasantly on Warenne’s ear, as the oracular dictum of his old fellow campaigner, Mr. Morris, the regimental Æsculapius. There seemed to be a weight taken from his breast, which he felt it would have been impossible for him to sustain.

“Thank Heaven!” murmured he to himself, “I am not a murderer!” Then turning to O’Neil, he said aloud, “We part friends, I hope, not the less that you are to live.”

O’Neil smiled faintly, and once again held out his hand. Warenne shook it warmly, and immediately proceeded on his return to ——, that he might procure further assistance, and the means of conveyance for his former foe.

As he turned to leave him, he laid his hand, as he supposed, on Stuart’s arm for support—it was Frank’s! Poor Frank had slept but for an instant, and on awakening, had sought his brother’s apartment. Finding that he was gone out, he had immediately ran down, through the court-yard of the inn, to a spot in the high road from whence he could command a view over the adjacent country, where catching a glimpse of two figures, about a mile from him, quitting the beaten track, he had rightly conjectured they were Stuart and his principal. He followed as fast as he was able, and arrived on the ground just in time to see O’Neil fall. He had then stolen up during the interval of confusion which ensued, and behind his brother had awaited the surgeon’s decision.

Warenne recognised Frank, but simply pressed his arm with affection. His heart was too full for utterance, and the silence was not broken, until the latter exclaimed, “Thank God! Gerald, you are yet spared to us!”

“Thank God, indeed!” replied the other. The deep but subdued tone of his voice expressing the sincerity with which he acknowledged the mercy of that Being, not only in preserving his life from destruction, but his conscience from a horrible crime.

Stuart soon afterwards joined them. “Warenne,” said he, “I congratulate you on being so well out of this business; for the wound in your arm is a trifle. Of all life’s disagreeable accidents, in my opinion, there is nothing so unpleasant as a duel; nothing so unsatisfactory; nothing—I beg your pardon—so foolish.”

“Do not beg my pardon,” replied Warenne; “all you say is true, and if the encounter ends in the death of either party, nothing so dreadful, both with regard to him who is hurried from the very act of sin, into the presence of his Maker, and to him who survives, to wear out a melancholy existence in unavailing remorse.”

Such weak and unstable creatures are we! Knowing the better line of conduct, but preferring the worse; afraid of the breath of our own species, who can only hurt the body, yet scrupling not to incur the anger of Him who can destroy both body and soul.

Warenne, a man of excellent principles, of commanding talents, and in the habit of controlling his passions, though he acknowledged the heinousness of the offence he was about to commit, and though he avowed his obligations to obey the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill!” could not subdue his worldly pride, but shrank from the danger of disgrace.

A quarter of an hour’s walk brought the party to their quarters; and Warenne, having thanked his old friend Stuart for the kind fulfilment of the disagreeable office which had devolved upon him, retired with Frank to his apartment.

When the two brothers were again alone in that room in which, not much more than two hours before, they had parted from each other with such painful emotions, Warenne, who could not reconcile to his conscience the steps which he had taken, though he had wilfully blinded himself to their inconsistency with his duty as a Christian, and was, moreover, much agitated with his narrow escape from more serious and irretrievable guilt, gave way to his feelings, and hastily saying, “Frank, you must pray for forgiveness for me!” threw himself on his knees by his bedside, and earnestly entreated pardon of his offended Creator.

Frank silently placed himself beside him, and for a few minutes both were absorbed in their devotions; those of the latter, perhaps, assuming the tone of grateful thanksgiving, rather than of anxious supplication. Warenne then rose composed and calm, and looking affectionately on his brother, whose tearful countenance betrayed the sincerity of the feeling in which he had prayed, bade him hasten to prepare for their march. How lightly, how gladly did Frank now obey him!

In an hour the bugles sounded, and the busy scene of departure commenced. The street was alive with men and horses, as the small parties came up from their different billets, and respectively fell into their places. Warenne had taken advantage of the interval to have his wound examined and dressed, and walked down the ranks to assume the command of his regiment with his cloak drawn over his bandaged arm, a little paler, perhaps, and graver than usual, but collected and self-possessed. A glance at his men showed him, that in the short time which had elapsed, the particulars of the duel had transpired. They were standing by their horses ready to mount; and as he passed along their front, one or two of the old veterans, who had fought through the peninsular campaigns with him, and considered him almost to belong to them, ventured to murmur reproachfully,—

“Surely, sir, _you_ need not have gone to show your courage; if any thing had happened to you, what would have become of us? It’s a’most too bad of you.” And in a second more Henry Marston came up with a flushed face, and asked him how he could think of putting his life in danger to cover his foolish disputes with the Irish guests.

“Why,” said he earnestly, “did you not let some one of us young ones fight O’Neil?”

Warenne’s pale cheek received a slight tinge of colour, as he heard the affectionate remonstrances of his old soldiers; but he answered them only with a look of kind acknowledgment; to Henry, however, he replied smilingly, “Never mind now, Henry, I promise you that you shall shoot the next man who behaves ill at our mess; in the mean time I’ll try if I cannot occupy you more profitably.” Then hastening to mount his horse, he gave the signal for immediate departure.