"
Fletcher looked steadfastly at the speaker. "And if I decline?"
"I think you have been long enough in California, Mr. Fletcher, to know
the alternative expected of a gentleman," said Grant, coldly.
Mr. Fletcher kept his gentle blue eyes--in which surprise still
overbalanced their expression of pained concern--on Grant's face.
"But is not this more in the style of Colonel Starbottle than Professor
Grant?" he asked, with a faint smile.
Grant rose instantly with a white face. "You will have a better
opportunity of judging," he said, "when Colonel Starbottle has the honor
of waiting upon you from me. Meantime, I thank you for reminding me of
the indiscretion into which my folly, in still believing that this thing
could be settled amicably, has led me."
He bowed coldly and withdrew. Nevertheless, as he mounted his horse
and rode away, he felt his cheeks burning. Yet he had acted upon calm
consideration; he knew that to the ordinary Californian experience there
was nothing quixotic nor exaggerated in the attitude he had taken. Men
had quarreled and fought on less grounds; he had even half convinced
himself that he HAD been insulted, and that his own professional
reputation demanded the withdrawal of the attack on Harcourt on
purely business grounds; but he was not satisfied of the personal
responsibility of Fletcher nor of his gratuitous malignity. Nor did the
man look like a tool in the hands of some unscrupulous and hidden enemy.
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