“Come, my son,” said the scout in a gentle voice.  “They ain’t a cloud an’ the moon has got a smile on her face.  Come, my young David.  Here’s the breeches an’ the purty stockin’s an’ shoes, an’ the lily white shirt.  Slip ’em on an’ we’ll kneel down an’ have a word o’ prayer.  This ’ere ain’t no common fight.  It’s a battle with tyranny.  It’s like the fight o’ David an’ Goliar.  Here’s yer ol’ sling waitin’ fer ye!”

Solomon felt the pistols and stroked their grips with a loving hand.

Side by side they knelt by the bed together for a moment of silent prayer.

Others were stirring in the inn.  They could hear footsteps and low voices in a room near them.  Jack put on his suit of brown velvet and his white silk stockings and best linen, which he had brought in a small bag.  Jack was looking at the pistols, when there came a rap at the door.  Preston entered with Doctor Brooks.

“We are to go out quietly ahead of the others,” said the Captain.  “They will follow in five minutes.”

Solomon had put on the old hanger which had come to England with him in his box.  He put the pistols in his pocket and they left the inn by a rear door.  A groom was waiting there with the horses saddled and bridled.  They mounted them and rode to the field of honor.  When they dismounted on the ground chosen, the day was dawning, but the great oaks were still waist deep in gloom.  It was cold.

Preston called his friends to his side and said: 

“You will fight at twenty paces.  I shall count three and when I drop my handkerchief you are both to fire.”

Solomon turned to Jack and said: 

“If ye fire quick mebbe ye’ll take the crook out o’ his finger ’fore it has time to pull.”

The other party was coming.  There were six men in it.  The General and his son and one other were in military dress.  The General was chatting with a friend.  The pistols were loaded by Solomon and General Clarke, while each watched the other.  The Lieutenant’s friends and seconds stood close together laughing at some jest.

“That’s funny, I’ll say, what—­what!” said one of the gentlemen.

Jack turned to look at him, for there had been a curious inflection in his “what, what!” He was a stout, highly colored man with large, staring gray eyes.  The young American wondered where he had seen him before.

Preston paced the ground and laid down strips of white ribband marking the distance which was to separate the principals.  He summoned the young men and said:  “Gentlemen, is there no way in which your honor can be satisfied without fighting?”

They shook their heads.

“Your stations have been chosen by lot.  Irons, yours is there.  Take your ground, gentlemen.”

The young men walked to their places and at this point the graphic Major Solomon Binkus, whose keen eyes observed every detail of the scene, is able to assume the position of narrator, the words which follow being from a letter he wrote to John Irons of Albany.