arrangements. He returned with a smile on his face and, rubbing his
hands, said:

"Cheer up, me boy, it's all settled."

"What? won't we fight?"

"Yes, it's settled that you will fight."

For a long time, Fernando was silent, and then he said:

"When will it take place, Terrence?"

"To-morrow morning at sunrise."

Fernando did not go to school that day. Sukey was enjoined to keep the
matter a secret, and he went to his classroom as if nothing unusual were
about to happen. Fernando spent the day in writing letters to be sent
home in case he should not survive the affair which, after all, he
believed to be disgraceful. Dueling he thought little better than
murder; but he was in for it and determined not to show the white
feather. Don't blame Fernando, for he lived in a barbarous age, when the
"code of honor" was thought to be honorable. His chief remorse was for
his madcap, drunken freak, which had been the provocation for the
event, and yet, when he came to think of the ludicrousness of his
adventures, he smiled.

More than once on that gloomy day he thought of Morgianna, whom in
reality he loved at first sight. Would he ever see her again, or was she
only the evening star, which had risen on the last hours of his
existence? When Sukey returned, he held a long interview with him and
gave him a bundle of letters and papers to send home if--he could not
finish the sentence.

"Ain't there no way to get out of it, Fernando?" asked Sukey, his droll
face comical even in distress.

"Not honorably."

"Well, now that you're in the game, just shoot that infernal
Englishman's head right off his shoulders, that's my advice. I've read
lots about duels, and it all depends on who is quickest at the trigger.
Take good aim and don't let him get a second the advantage of you."

They went to bed early, and Fernando slept soundly. It was Terrence who
awoke them and said it would not do to be late. He had engaged a sailor
called Luff Williams to take them in his boat to the spot, a long sandy
beach behind a high promontory some five or six miles from the city. The
spot was quite secluded, and Terrence declared it a love of a place for
such little affairs.

"What are ye thinkin' of, Fernando?" asked Terrence, when the boat with
the three young men was under way.

"I'm thinking, sir, if I were to kill him, what I must do after."

"Right, my boy; nothing like it; but 1811 will settle all for ye. I
don't believe, now that Ame