know any more. I am here--we are here, Monsieur Dorsenne and I, to listen
to the complaints which Count Gorka has commissioned you to formulate to
Monsieur Florent Chapron's proxies. Formulate those complaints, and we
will discuss them. Formulate the reparation you claim in the name of your
client and we will discuss it. The papers will follow, if they follow at
all, and, once more, neither you nor we know what will be the issue of
this conversation, nor should we know it, before establishing the facts."

"There is some misunderstanding, sir," said Ardea, whom Montfanon's words
had irritated somewhat. He could not, any more than Hafner, understand
the very simple, but very singular, character of the Marquis, and he
added: "I have been concerned in several 'rencontres'--four times as
second, and once as principal--and I have seen employed without
discussion the proceeding which Baron Hafner has just proposed to you,
and which of itself is, perhaps, only a more expeditious means of
arriving at what you very properly call the establishment of facts."

"I was not aware of the number of your affairs, sir," replied Montfanon,
still more nervous since Hafner's future son-in-law joined in the
conversation; "but since it has pleased you to tell us I will take the
liberty of saying to you that I have fought seven times, and that I have
been a second fourteen.... It is true that it was at an epoch when the
head of your house was your father, if I remember right, the deceased
Prince Urban, whom I had the honor of knowing when I served in the
zouaves. He was a fine Roman nobleman, and did honor to his name. What I
have told you is proof that I have some competence in the matter of a
duel.... Well, we have always held that seconds were constituted to
arrange affairs that could be arranged, but also to settle affairs, as
well as they can, that seem incapable of being arranged. Let us now
inquire into the matter; we are here for that, and for nothing else."

"Are these gentlemen of that opinion?" asked Hafner in a conciliatory
voice, turning first to Dorsenne, then to Ardea: "I do not adhere to my
method," he continued, again folding his paper. He slipped it into his
vest-pocket and continued: "Let us establish the facts, as you say. Count
Gorka, our friend, considers himself seriously, very seriously, offended
by Monsieur Florent Chapron in the course of the discussion in a public
street. Monsieur Chapron was carried away, as you kn