lenge is cheap, sir, as your
insult."

Payton stared. He had never been more astonished in his life. "Good
L--d!" he cried. "You do not fight? Heaven and earth! and you a
soldier!"

"I do not fight."

"After that, man! Not--after----" He did not finish the sentence, but
laughed with uplifted chin, as at some great joke.

"No," Colonel John said between his teeth.

And then no one spoke. A something in Colonel John's tone and manner, a
something in the repression of his voice, sobered the spectators, and
turned that which might have seemed an ignominy, a surrender, into a
tragedy. And a tragedy in which they all had their share. For the
insult had been so wanton, so gross, so brutal, that there was not one
of the witnesses who had not felt shame, not one whose sympathy had not
been for a moment with the victim, and who did not experience a pang on
his account as he stood, mild and passive, before them.

Payton alone was moved only by contempt. "Lord above us, man!" he
cried, finding his voice again. Are you a Quaker? If so, why the devil
do you call yourself a soldier?"

"I am no Quaker," Colonel John answered, "but I do not fight duels."

"Why?"

"If I killed you," the Colonel replied, eyeing him steadily, "would it
dry my neckcloth or clean my face?"

"No!" Payton retorted with a sneer, "but it would clean your honour!"
He had felt the reprehension in the air, he had been conscious for a
few seconds that he had not the room with him; but the perception made
him only the more arrogant now that he felt his feet again. "It would
prove, man, that, unlike the beasts that perish, you valued something
more than your life!"

"I do."

"What?" Payton asked with careless disdain.

"Among other things, my duty." Payton laughed brutally. "Why, by the
powers, you _are_ a preacher!" he retorted. "Hang your duty, sir, and
you for a craven! Give me acts, not words! It's a man's duty to defend
his honour, and you talk of your neckcloth! There's for a new
neckcloth!" He pulled out a half-crown and flung it, with an insulting
gesture, upon the table. "Show us your back, and for the future give
gentlemen of honour--a wide berth! You are no mate for them!"

The act and the words were too strong for the stomachs of the more
generous among his hearers. A murmur, an undoubted murmur rose--for if
Payton was feared he was not loved; and the sallow-faced man, whose
name was Marsh, spoke out. "Easy, Payton," he said. "The gentle