_W_hen Arthur Brent had read Edmonia’s letter, he mounted Gimlet and rode away with no purpose except to think. The letter had revealed some things to him of which he had not before had even a suspicion. He understood now why Madison Peyton had been so anxious to become Dorothy’s guardian and so angry over his disappointment in that matter. For on the preceding evening Archer Bannister had ridden over from the Court House to tell him of Peyton’s offensive words and to deliver the letter of apology into his hands. “I don’t see how you can challenge him after that” said Archer, with some uncertainty in his tone. “Why should I wish to do so?” Arthur asked in surprise. “I have something very much more important to think about just now than Madison Peyton’s opinion of me. You yourself tell me that when he was saying all these things about me, he only got himself laughed at for his pains. Nobody thought the worse of me for anything that he said, and certainly nobody would think the better of me for challenging him to a duel and perhaps shooting him or getting shot. Of course I could not challenge him now, as he has made a written withdrawal of his words and given me an apology which I am at liberty to tack up on the court house door if I choose, as I certainly do not. But I should not have challenged him in any case.” “I suppose you are right,” answered Archer; “indeed I know you are. But it requires a good deal of moral courage--more than I suspect myself of possessing--to fly in the face of Virginia opinion in that way.” “But what is Virginia opinion on the subject of duelling, Archer? I confess I can’t find out.” “How do you mean?” asked the other. “Why, it seems to me that opinion here on that subject is exceedingly inconsistent and contradictory. Dorothy once said, when she was a child,”--there was a world of significance in the past tense of that phrase--“that if a man in Virginia fights a duel for good cause, everybody condemns him for being so wicked and breaking the laws in that fashion; but if he doesn’t fight when good occasion arises, everybody calls him a coward and blames him more than in the other case. So I do not know what Virginia opinion is. And even the laws do not enlighten me. Many years ago the Legislature adopted a statute making duelling a crime, but I have never heard of anybody being punished for that crime. On the contrary the statute seems to have been carefully framed to prevent the punishment of anybody for duelling. It makes a principal in the crime of everybody who in any capacity participates in a duel, whether as fighter or second, or surgeon or mere looker on. In other words it makes a principal of every possible witness, and then excuses all of them from testifying to the fact of a duel on the ground that to testify to that fact would incriminate themselves. I saw a very interesting farce of that sort played in a Richmond court a month or so ago. Are you interested to hear about it?” “Yes, tell me!”