“Gentlemen,” said Rose, and I knew she was standing between us and again looking from one to the other with that gaze I dare not meet, “what is this you would have done? Fie upon you! Surely you do not call it manly to steal out here at this hour, as if you were thieves, so that you might fire at each other? Why, this is a coward’s action.”
“Oh,” said Ben, “what wise words! Just what I said myself. Go on, Mistress Rose; go on and spare not.”
“If I had not come when I did,” she continued, paying no more heed to Ben than if he had been a tree-stump, “one of you might now have been lying dead. What sort of news would that have been for his friends? Brave men, truly, to think so little of other people’s feelings.”
“Admirable!” cried Ben Tuckett. “Go on; sure-faith, I could not have said more myself.”
“Put up your pistols,” she said, “put up your pistols and go home, for pity’s sake. Let us have no fighting here. Pray God give you better minds of it.”
Now, I never wanted to fight, and wanted less than ever now, and I was ready enough to put up my pistol and go. But Dennis Watson was not minded to take Rose’s advice, neither was he slow in saying so.
“That is all very well, mistress,” said he with a sneer on his dark face, “but it is not agreeable to me. I came out here to shoot Will Dale yonder, and as fortune hath favoured me with the first shot, shoot him I will. So retire, mistress, if you do not wish to see blood spilt.”
She looked at him very steadily and sternly, for I think that speech of his had shown her what manner of man he was, and he somewhat blanched as he met the glance she gave him. But she came rather closer to me, keeping herself between me and the pistol in his hand.
“Then, sir,” she said, “you may shoot him through me. For I shall not stand aside whatever you say or threaten.”
“Stand aside, dear Rose,” I said, speaking for the first time since she entered the clearing. “Let him fire, if he will: I do not believe he can hit me.”
“Nay,” she said. “There shall be nothing left to chance.”
And there she stood facing Dennis Watson’s pistol, which he still held ready to discharge. And he, presently seeing that her purpose was firm, began to mutter threats and oaths, and then taunts and jeers.
“Ah!” he said, “I see how it is. A pretty plot is this, and mighty neat in its arrangement. We have been fooled, Tom Gascoyne. A pretty thing for a man who is going to fight a duel to arrange matters so that a lady stops the affair at the right moment. I warrant me Mistress Rose would not have stepped out so promptly if our enemy had had first shot.”
Now, this so incensed me that I started forward fiercely, intending to chastise Dennis for his insolence, but Rose barred my path and prevented me.
“Leave him alone, Will,” she said, and at the touch of her hand I restrained myself. “Master Watson,” she continued, turning to Dennis, “you are a poor, pitiful liar. If you were aught of a man you would know that a woman would not lend herself to such a poor trick as that. Do you think I could not find this matter out for myself?”
“Gentlemen,” said Tom Gascoyne, “this affair is at an end, I think. What say you, Master Tuckett?”
“I say yes,” said Ben. “And very gladly, for ’tis a cold morning and I am shivering. Let us withdraw our forces.”
“Come, Dennis,” said Gascoyne, “let us go;” and he took Watson’s arm to lead him away.
But Dennis went reluctantly, favouring me and Rose with many an evil glance. And at the edge of the clearing he turned and looked at us once more, and cried out, “I will hit you yet, Will Dale, and in your tenderest spot, too!” and disappeared in the woods, which echoed to his sneering laughter. And so the duel was over.
“Beshrew me,” said Ben, “but I am as cold as any icicle. I shall run homewards, with your permission, for I doubt not you will be able to bring Mistress Rose home by yourself, Will.”
And therewith he leapt the fence into the meadows and went homewards at a dogtrot, so that his short, sturdy figure was soon out of sight in the dim winter’s light, and Rose and I were alone. There we stood in the clearing for a moment or two, neither of us speaking. I think she was looking at me, but I am quite sure that I did not dare to look at her. Yet it was necessary to say some word or other, so at last I plucked up courage to speak.
“Mistress Rose,” I said, “I beg your pardon.”
After this was out I felt bold enough to meet her gaze. She was looking at me with reproachful eyes, and I noticed that she was very pale, and that her face bore an expression of pain which I had never seen there before. She said nothing when I spoke, but still looked at me. And yet I could see that she was not angry with me as she had been with Dennis, for her expression was more like that of a mother
