CHAPTER I.A CHALLENGE.
“Nothing, sir, can induce me to surrender my claim.”
“I am sorry for it, count, but in such a matter your
views cannot modify mine.”
“But allow me to point out that my seniority unquestionably
gives me a prior right.”
“Mere seniority, I assert, in an affair of this kind, cannot
possibly entitle you to any prior claim whatever.”
“Then, captain, no alternative is left but for me to
compel you to yield at the sword's point.”
“That's as you please, count; but neither sword nor
pistol can ever force me to forego my pretensions. Here is
my card.”
“And mine.”
This rapid altercation was thus brought to an end by
the formal interchange of the names of the disputants.
On one of the cards was inscribed—
Captain Hector Servadac,
Staff Officer,
Mostaganem.
On the other was the title—
Count Wassili Timascheff,
On board the Schooner “Dobryna.”
It did not take long to arrange that seconds should be
appointed, who would meet in Mostaganem at two o'clock
that day; and the captain and the count were on the
point of parting from each other, with a salute of punctilious
courtesy, when Timascheff, as if struck by a sudden
thought, said abruptly—
“Perhaps it would be better, captain, not to allow the
real cause of this to transpire?”
“Far better,” replied Servadac; “it is undesirable in
every way for any names to be mentioned.”
“In that case, however,” continued the count, “it will
be necessary to assign an ostensible pretext of some kind.
Shall we allege a musical dispute? a contention in which
I feel bound to defend Wagner, while you are the zealous
champion of Rossini?”
“I am quite content,” answered Servadac, with a smile;
and with another low bow they parted.
The scene, as here depicted, took place upon the
extremity of a little cape on the Algerian coast, between
Mostaganem and Tenes, about two miles from the mouth
of the Shelif. The headland rose more than sixty feet
above the sea-level, and the azure waters of the Mediterranean,
as they softly kissed the strand, were tinged with
the reddish hue of the ferriferous rocks that formed its
base. It was the 31st of December. The noontide sun,
which usually illuminated the various projections of the
coast with a dazzling brightness, was hidden by a dense
mass of cloud, and the fog which, from some unaccountable
cause, had hung for the last two months over nearly
every region in the world, causing serious interruption to
traffic between continent and continent, spread its dreary
veil across land and sea.
After taking leave of the staff-officer, Count Wassili
Timascheff wended his way down to a small creek, and
took his seat in the stern of a light four-oar that had been
awaiting his return; this was immediately pushed off from
shore, and was soon alongside a pleasure-yacht, that was
lying to, not many cables' length away.
At a sign from Servadac, an orderly, who had been
standing at a respectful distance, led forward a magnificent
Arabian horse; the captain vaulted into the saddle, and
followed by his attendant, well mounted as himself, started
off towards Mostaganem. It was half-past twelve when
the two riders crossed the bridge that had been recently
erected over the Shelif, and a quarter of an hour later
their steeds, flecked with foam, dashed through the Mascara
Gate, which was one of five entrances opened in
the embattled wall that encircled the town.
At that date, Mostaganem contained about fifteen
thousand inhabitants, three thousand of whom were French.
Besides being one of the principal district towns of the
province of Oran, it was also a military station. Valuable
woven fabrics, morocco leather work, articles made from
the esparto (a Spanish rush), and numerous nutritive compounds
were amongst its manufactures, whilst grain, cotton,
wool, figs, and grapes, as well as cattle, were exported
thence to France. All traces however had disappeared of
the ancient anchorage, where, in past years, vessels had
been unable to hold their own during the westerly and
north-westerly gales, and Mostaganem now rejoiced in a
well-sheltered harbour, which enabled her to utilize all the
rich products of the Mina and the Lower Shelif. It was
the existence of so good a harbour amidst the exposed
cliffs of this coast that had induced the owner of the
Dobryna to winter in these parts, and for two months the
Russian standard had been seen floating from her yard,
whilst on her mast-head was hoisted the pennant of the
French Yacht Club, with the distinctive letters M.C.W.T.,
the initials of Count Timascheff.
Having entered the town, Captain Servadac made his
way towards Matmore, the military quarter, and was not
long in finding two friends on whom he might rely—a
major of the 2nd Fusileers, and a captain of the 8th
Artillery. The two officers listened gravely enough to
Servadac's request that they would act as his seconds in
an affair of honour, but could not resist a smile on hearing
that the dispute between him and the count had originated
in a musical discussion. Surely, they suggested, the matter
might be easily arranged; a few slight concessions on
either side, and all might be amicably adjusted. But no
representations on their part were of any avail. Hector
Servadac was inflexible.
“No concession is possible,” he replied, resolutely.
“Rossini has been deeply injured, and I cannot suffer the
injury to be unavenged. Wagner is a fool. I shall keep
my word. I am quite firm.”
“Be it so, then,” replied one of the officers; “and after
all, you know, a sword-cut need not be a very serious
affair.”
“Certainly not,” rejoined Servadac; “and especially
in my case, when I have not the slightest intention of
being wounded at all.”
Incredulous as they naturally were as to the assigned
cause of the quarrel, Servadac's friends had no alternative
but to accept his explanation, and without farther parley
they started for the staff office, where, at two o'clock precisely,
they were to meet the seconds of Count Timascheff.
Two hours later they had returned. All the preliminaries
had been arranged; the count, who like many Russians
abroad was an aide-de-camp of the Czar, had of course
proposed swords as the most appropriate weapons, and
the duel was to take place on the following morning, the
first of January, at nine o'clock, upon the cliff at a spot
about a mile and a half from the mouth of the Shelif.
With the assurance that they would not fail to keep their
appointment with military punctuality, the two officers
cordially wrung their friend's hand and retired to the
Zulma Cafe for a game at piquet. Captain Servadac at
once retraced his steps and left the town.
For the last fortnight Servadac had not been occupying
his proper lodgings in the military quarters; having been
appointed to make a local levy, he had been living in a
gourbi, or native hut, on the Mostaganem coast, between
four and five miles from the Shelif. His orderly was his
sole companion, and by any other man than the captain
the enforced exile would have been esteemed little short
of a severe penance.
On his road to the gourbi, his mental occupation was
a very laborious effort to put together what he was
pleased to call a rondo, upon a model of versification all
but obsolete. This rondo, it is unnecessary to conceal, was
to be an ode addressed to a young widow by whom he
had been captivated, and whom he was anxious to marry,
and the tenour of his muse was intended to prove that
when once a man has found an object in all respects
worthy of his affections, he should love her “in all simplicity.”
Whether the aphorism were universally true was
not very material to the gallant captain, whose sole ambition
at present was to construct a roundelay of which this
should be the prevailing sentiment. He indulged the
fancy that he might succeed in producing a composition
which would have a fine effect here in Algeria, where
poetry in that form was all but unknown.
“I know well enough,” he said repeatedly to himself,
“what I want to say. I want to tell her that I love her
sincerely, and wish to marry her; but, confound it! the
words won't rhyme. Plague on it! Does nothing rhyme
with ‘simplicity’? Ah! I have it now—
‘Lovers should, whoe'er they be
Love in all simplicity.’
But what next? how am I to go on? I say, Ben Zoof,”
he called aloud to his orderly, who was trotting silently
close in his rear, “did you ever compose any poetry?”
“No, captain,” answered the man promptly; “I have
never made any verses, but I have seen them made fast
enough at a booth during the fete of Montmartre.”
“Can you remember them?”
“Remember them! to be sure I can. This is the way
they began—
‘Come in! come in! you'll not repent
The entrance money you have spent;
The wondrous mirror in this place
Reveals your future sweetheart's face.’”
“Bosh!” cried Servadac in disgust; “your verses are
detestable trash.”
“As good as any others, captain, squeaked through a
reed pipe.”
“Hold your tongue, man,” said Servadac peremptorily;
“I have made another couplet.
‘Lovers should, whoe'er they be
Love in all simplicity;
Lover, loving honestly,
Offer I myself to thee.’”
Beyond this, however, the captain's poetical genius was
impotent to carry him; his farther efforts were unavailing,
and when at six o'clock he reached the gourbi,
lines still remained the limit of his composition.
