Adventure and adventurers -- Fiction; Short stories
details, these gentlemen declared that they could not have allowed that
sort of hacking to go on indefinitely. Asked whether the quarrel was
settled this time, they gave it out as their conviction that it was a
difference which could only be settled by one of the parties remaining
lifeless on the ground. The sensation spread from army corps to army
corps, and penetrated at last to the smallest detachments of the troops
cantoned between the Rhine and the Save. In the cafes in Vienna it was
generally estimated, from details to hand, that the adversaries would be
able to meet again in three weeks’ time on the outside. Something really
transcendent in the way of duelling was expected.
</p>
<p>
These expectations were brought to naught by the necessities of the
service which separated the two officers. No official notice had been
taken of their quarrel. It was now the property of the army, and not to be
meddled with lightly. But the story of the duel, or rather their duelling
propensities, must have stood somewhat in the way of their advancement,
because they were still captains when they came together again during the
war with Prussia. Detached north after Jena, with the army commanded by
Marshal Bernadotte, Prince of Ponte Corvo, they entered Lubeck together.
</p>
<p>
It was only after the occupation of that town that Captain Feraud found
leisure to consider his future conduct in view of the fact that Captain
D’Hubert had been given the position of third aide-de-camp to the marshal.
He considered it a great part of a night, and in the morning summoned two
sympathetic friends.
</p>
<p>
“I’ve been thinking it over calmly,” he said, gazing at them with
blood-shot, tired eyes. “I see that I must get rid of that intriguing
personage. Here he’s managed to sneak on to the personal staff of the
marshal. It’s a direct provocation to me. I can’t tolerate a situation in
which I am exposed any day to receive an order through him. And God knows
what order, too! That sort of thing has happened once before—and
that’s once too often. He understands this perfectly, never fear. I can’t
tell you any more. Now you know what it is you have to do.”
</p>
<p>
This encounter took place outside the town of Lubeck, on very open ground,
selected with special care in deference to the general sentiment of the
cavalry division belonging to the army corps, that this time the two
officers should meet on horseback. After all, this duel was a cavalry
affair, and to persist in fighting on foot would look like a slight on
one’s own arm of the service. The seconds, startled by the unusual nature
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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