"For your friend? For your dead, useless friend?" He dropped the words slowly, one by one, with a smiling disbelief. "Come, come, Mr. Buckler! Not for your friend! We are both men of the world. Be frank with me! Is it sensible that two gentlemen should spill honest blood for the sake of a feather-headed wanton?" "If the name fits her, my lord," I replied, "who is to blame for that? And as for the honest blood, I have more hope of spilling it than faith in its honesty." The Count's face grew purple, and the veins swelled out upon his ample throat. I snatched up the pistol, and we both stood trembling with passion. The next moment, I think, must have decided the quarrel, but for a light sound which became distinctly audible in the silence. It descended from the room above. We both looked up to the ceiling, the Count with a sudden softness on his face, and I understood, or rather I thought I understood, why he had not raised the alarm before I produced my pistol, and why he bade me subsequently speak in English. For the sound was a tapping, such as a woman's heels may make upon a polished floor. I waited, straining my ears to hear the little stairway creak behind the door at my back, and cudgelling my brains to think what I should do. If she came down into the room, it was all over with my project and, most likely, with my life, too, unless I was prepared to shoot my opponent in cold blood and make a bolt for it. After a while, however, the sound ceased altogether, to my indescribable relief. The Count was the first to break the silence. "Very well, Mr. Buckler," said he; "send your friends to me in the morning. Let them come like men to the door and give me assurance that I may meet you without loss of self-respect, and you shall have your way." "You force me to repeat," said I, "that the matter must be disposed of to-night." "To-night!" he said, and stared at me incredulously. "Mr. Buckler, you must be mad." "To-night," I repeated stubbornly. For, apart from all considerations of safety, I felt that such courage as I possessed was but the froth of my anger, and would soon vanish if it were left to stand. The Count began to pace the room between the writing-table and the window. I set my chair against the wall and leaned against the chimney, and I noted that at each turn in his walk he drew, as though unconsciously, nearer and nearer to the bell. "Mr. Buckler," he said, "what you propose is quite out of the question. I can but attribute it to your youth. You take too little thought of my side of the case. To fight with one whom I have never so much as set eyes on before, who forces his way into my house in the dead of night--you must see for yourself that it fits not my dignity." "You are too close to the bell, Count Lukstein, and you raise your voice," I broke in sharply. "That fits not my safety."