These Old Shades Read Online Free PDF

Saint-Vire feet. There was much more, but at length the noble Henri came to his peroration. For my impudence I was to receive a thrashing at his hands. I! Alastair of Avon!”
    “But, Justin, he must have been mad! It was not as though you were low-born! The Alastairs——”
    “Precisely. He was mad. These red-haired people, my dear Hugh! And there was something between us. No doubt I had at some time or other behaved abominably to him. There followed, as you may imagine, a short argument. It did not take me long to come to my peroration. In short, I had the pleasure of cutting his face open with his own whip. Out came his sword.” Avon stretched out his arm, and the muscles rippled beneath the satin of his coat sleeve. “I was young, but I knew a little of the art of the duello, even in those days. I pinked him so well that he had to be carried home in my coach, by my lackeys. When he had departed I gave myself up to thought. You see, my dear, I was, or fancied that I was, very much in love with that—er—red-haired shrew. The noble Henri had told me that his sister had deemed herself insulted by my court. It occurred to me that perhaps the lady had mistaken my suit for a casual intrigue. I visited the Hotel Saint-Vire to make known mine intentions. I was received not by her father, but by the noble Henri, reclining upon a couch. There were also some friends of his. I forget. Before them, before his lackeys, he informed me that he stood in—er— loco parentis , and that his sister’s hand was denied me. Further that if I so much as dared to accost her his servants would whip me from her presence.”
    “Good God!” cried Hugh.
    “So I thought. I retired. What would you? I could not touch the man; I had wellnigh killed him already. When next I appeared in public I found that my visit to the Hôtel Saint-Vire had become the talk of Paris. I was compelled to leave France for a time. Happily another scandal arose which cast mine into the shade, so Paris was once more open to me. It is an old, old story, Hugh, but I have not forgotten.”
    “And he?”
    “He has not forgotten either. He was half mad at the time, but he would not apologize when he came to his senses; I don’t think I expected him to do so. We meet now as distant acquaintances; we are polite—oh, scrupulously!—but he knows that I am still waiting.”
    “Waiting . . . ?”
    Justin walked to the table and set down his glass.
    “For an opportunity to pay that debt in full,” he said softly.
    “Vengeance?” Hugh leaned forward. “I thought you disliked melodrama, my friend?”
    “I do; but I have a veritable passion for—justice.”
    “You’ve nourished thoughts of—vengeance—for twenty years?”
    “My dear Hugh, if you imagine that the lust for vengeance has been my dominating emotion for twenty years, permit me to correct the illusion.”
    “Has it not grown cold?” Hugh asked, disregarding.
    “Very cold, my dear, but none the less dangerous.”
    “And all this time not one opportunity has presented itself?”
    “You see, I wish it to be thorough,” apologized the Duke.
    “Are you nearer success now than you were—twenty years ago?”
    A soundless laugh shook Justin.
    “We shall see. Rest assured that when it comes it will be—so!” Very slowly he clenched his hand on his snuffbox, and opened his fingers to show the thin gold crushed.
    Hugh gave a little shiver.
    “My God, Justin, do you know just how vile you can be?”
    “Naturally Do they not call me—Satanas?” The mocking smile came; the eyes glittered.
    “I hope to heaven Saint-Vire never puts himself in your power! It seems they were right who named you Satanas!”
    “Quite right, my poor Hugh.”
    “Does Saint-Vire’s brother know?”
    “Armand? No one knows save you, and I, and Saint-Vire. Armand may guess, of course.”
    “And yet you and he are friends!”
    “Oh, Armand’s hatred for the noble Henri is more violent than ever mine could be.”
    In spite