“Murder!” echoed her son, looking askance, as if dodging the bailiffs.  “No, mother; I wanted nothing but what was fair.  Mr. Denbigh would have had an equal chance to blow out my brains; I am sure everything would have been fair.”

“Equal chance!” muttered his father, who had cooled himself, in some measure, by an extra pinch of snuff.  “No, sir, you have no brains to lose.  But I have promised Sir Edward that you shall make proper apologies to himself, to his daughter, and to Mr. Denbigh.”  This was rather exceeding the truth, but the alderman prided himself on performing rather more than he promised.

“Apology!” exclaimed the captain.  “Why, sir, the apology is due to me.  Ask Colonel Egerton if he ever heard of apologies being made by the challenger.”

“No, sure,” said the mother, who, having made out the truth of the matter, thought it was likely enough to be creditable to her child; “Colonel Egerton never heard of such a thing.  Did you, colonel?”

“Why, madam,” said the colonel, hesitatingly, and politely handing the merchant his snuff-box, which, in his agitation, had fallen on the floor, “circumstances sometimes justify a departure from ordinary measures.  You are certainly right as a rule; but not knowing the particulars in the present case, it is difficult for me to decide.  Miss Jarvis, the tilbury is ready.”

The colonel bowed respectfully to the merchant, kissed his hand to his wife, and led their daughter to his carriage.

“Do you make the apologies?” asked Mr. Jarvis, as the door closed.

“No, sir,” replied the captain, sullenly

“Then you must make your pay answer for the next sit months,” cried the father, taking a signed draft on his banker from his pocket, coolly tearing it in two pieces, carefully putting the name in his mouth, and chewing it into a ball.

“Why, alderman,” said his wife (a name she never used unless she had something to gain from her spouse, who loved to hear the appellation after he had relinquished the office), “it appears to me that Harry has shown nothing but a proper spirit.  You are unkind—­indeed you are.”

“A proper spirit?  In what way?  Do you know anything of the matter?”

“It is a proper spirit for a soldier to fight, I suppose,” said the wife, a little at a loss to explain.

“Spirit, or no spirit, apology, or ten and sixpence.”

“Harry,” said his mother, holding up her finger in a menacing attitude, as soon as her husband had left the room (for he had last spoken with the door in his hand), “if you do beg his pardon, you are no son of mine.”

“No,” cried Miss Sarah, “nor any brother of mine.  I would be insufferably mean.”

“Who will pay my debts?” asked the son, looking up at the ceiling.

“Why, I would, my child, if—­if—­I had not spent my own allowance.”

“I would,” echoed the sister; “but if we go to Bath, you know, I shall want all my money.”