“It must go on now to the end,” said Will Law, wearily.  “Mr. Wilson’s carriage is long past due.”

“But you—­what do you mean?  You’ve had no hand in this.  Even had you—­why, boy, you would be spitted in an instant by this fellow.”

“And would not that teach you to cease your mad pranks, and use to better purpose the talents God hath given you?  Yours is the better chance, Jack.”

“Peace!” cried John Law, tears starting to his eyes.  “I’ll not argue that.  Driver, turn back for home!”

The coachman at the box touched his hat with a puzzled air.  “I beg pardon, sir,” said he, “but I was under orders of the gentleman inside.”

“You were sent for Mr. John Law.”

“For Mr. Law—­”

“But I am John Law, sirrah!”

“You are both Mr. Law?  Well, sir, I scarce know which of you is the proper Mr. Law.  But I must say that here comes a coach drove fast enough, and perhaps this is the gentleman I was to wait for, according to the first Mr. Law, sir.”

“He is coming, then,” cried John Law, angrily.  “I’ll see into this pretty meeting.  If this devil’s own fool is to have a crossing of steel, I’ll fair accommodate him, and we’ll look into the reasons for it later.  Sit ye down!  Be quiet, Will, boy, I say!”

Law was a powerful man, over six feet in height.  The sports of the Highlands, combined with much fencing and continuous play in the tennis court, indeed his ardent love for every hardy exercise, had given his form alike solid strength and great activity.  “Jessamy Law,” they called him at home, in compliment of his slender though full and manly form.  Cool and skilful in all the games of his youth, as John Law himself had often calmly stated, in fence he had a knowledge amounting to science, a knowledge based upon the study of first principles.  The intricacies of the Italian school were to him an old story.  With the single blade he had never yet met his master.  Indeed, the thought of successful opposition seemed never to occur to him at all.  Certainly at this moment, angered at the impatient insolence of his adversary, the thought of danger was farthest from his mind.  Stronger than his brother, he pushed the latter back with one hand, grasping as he did so the small-sword with which the latter was provided.  With one leap he sprang from the carriage, leaving Will half dazed and limp within.

Even as he left the carriage step, he found himself confronted with an adversary eager as himself; for at that instant Beau Wilson was hastening from his coach.  Vain, weak and pompous in a way, yet lacking not in a certain personal valor, Beau Wilson stopped not for his seconds, tarried not to catch the other’s speech, but himself strode madly onward, his point raised slightly, as though he had lost all care and dignity and desired nothing so much as to stab his enemy as swiftly as might be.

It would have mattered nothing now to this Highlander, this fighting Argyll, what had been the reason animating his opponent.  It was enough that he saw a weapon bared.  Too late, then, to reason with John Law, “Beau” Law of Edinboro’, “Jessamy” Law, the best blade and the coolest head in all the schools of arms that taught him fence.