Put between the shame of eating his words before the whole town, and fear, that caught him by the throat with burning fingers; confronted by this mute personage, who seemed in no humor to stand nonsense, Stanislas chose the more remote peril.

“All right.  To-morrow morning,” he said, thinking that the matter might be arranged somehow or other.

The three went back to the room.  Everybody scanned their faces as they came in; Chatelet was smiling, M. de Bargeton looked exactly as if he were in his own house, but Stanislas looked ghastly pale.  At the sight of his face, some of the women here and there guessed the nature of the conference, and the whisper, “They are going to fight!” circulated from ear to ear.  One-half of the room was of the opinion that Stanislas was in the wrong, his white face and his demeanor convicted him of a lie; the other half admired M. de Bargeton’s attitude.  Chatelet was solemn and mysterious.  M. de Bargeton stayed a few minutes, scrutinized people’s faces, and retired.

“Have you pistols?” Chatelet asked in a whisper of Stanislas, who shook from head to foot.

Amelie knew what it all meant.  She felt ill, and the women flocked about her to take her into her bedroom.  There was a terrific sensation; everybody talked at once.  The men stopped in the drawing-room, and declared, with one voice, that M. de Bargeton was within his right.

“Would you have thought the old fogy capable of acting like this?” asked M. de Saintot.

“But he was a crack shot when he was young,” said the pitiless Jacques.  “My father often used to tell me of Bargeton’s exploits.”

“Pooh!  Put them at twenty paces, and they will miss each other if you give them cavalry pistols,” said Francis, addressing Chatelet.

Chatelet stayed after the rest had gone to reassure Stanislas and his wife, and to explain that all would go off well.  In a duel between a man of sixty and a man of thirty-five, all the advantage lay with the latter.

Early next morning, as Lucien sat at breakfast with David, who had come back alone from Marsac, in came Mme. Chardon with a scared face.

“Well, Lucien,” she said, “have you heard the news?  Everyone is talking of it, even the people in the market.  M. de Bargeton all but killed M. de Chandour this morning in M. Tulloy’s meadow; people are making puns on the name. (Tue Poie.) It seems that M. de Chandour said that he found you with Mme. de Bargeton yesterday.”

“It is a lie!  Mme. de Bargeton is innocent,” cried Lucien.

“I heard about the duel from a countryman, who saw it all from his cart.  M. de Negrepelisse came over at three o’clock in the morning to be M. de Bargeton’s second; he told M. de Chandour that if anything happened to his son-in-law, he should avenge him.  A cavalry officer lent the pistols.  M. de Negrepelisse tried them over and over again.  M. du Chatelet tried to prevent them from practising