A Challenge

: BOOK I.
: Off On A Comet

"Nothing, sir, can induce me to surrender my claim."



"I am sorry, 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 or me to compel you to yield

at the sword's point."



"As you please, count; but neither sword nor pistol can 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 for 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 cable lengths 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.

Mostaganem rejoiced in a well-sheltered harbor, which enabled her to

utilize all the rich products of the Mina and the Lower Shelif. It was

the existence of so good a harbor 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 honor, 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 way 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 tenor 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, the four lines still remained the limit of his

composition.