He walked to the river-bank and stood, as Cary had stood a little earlier, gazing over the falls and eddies and fairy islands to the blue woods on the farther shore.  Under the oak which he had left, the doctor looked and handled, with a pursed lip, a keen eye, and a final “Humph!” of relief.  “High and clean through and just a little splintered.  You’ll wear your arm in a sling for a while, Mr. Cary!  Mr. Fairfax Cary, you’re too white by half!  There’s a brandy flask in yonder case.  Mr. Jones, the wound is slight.”

“Why, that’s good hearing!” cried Skelton Jones.  “Mr. Cary must return to town in the coach, with Mr. Fairfax Cary and with you, Doctor.  Mr. Rand and I will take the chaise.  My profound regard, and my compliments, Mr. Cary!  Mr. Fairfax Cary, may I have the pleasure of acting with you again!  Doctor, good-morning.  Now, Mr. Rand.”

Rand turned from his contemplation of the river, advanced toward the group beneath the oak, and bowed with formality to Cary, who, arresting the doctor’s ministrations, returned the salute in kind.  The chaise, beckoned to by Mr. Jones, came up; there was a slight and final exchange of courtesies, and the two Republicans entered the vehicle and were driven away.

“Give them five minutes’ start, Fair,” ordered Cary.  “Then call the coach; I want to get back to town for the Washington mail.”

“You’ll get back to town and get to bed!” stormed the other. “’Fire in the air,’ quotha! I could have brought down a kite from the blue!  You might, at least, have broken a wing for him!”

“Oh, I might, I might,” said the other wearily.  “But I didn’t.  I never liked this work of breaking wings.  Now, Doctor, that is a bandage fit for a king!  Call the coach, Fair.  This much of the business is over.”

The chaise carrying Lewis Rand and his companion traversed with rapidity the miles to Richmond.  The road was fair, and the day bright and cool.  The meeting by the river had occupied hardly an hour; the world of the country was yet at its morning stirring, and filled with cheerful sound.  Above the fields the sky showed steel blue; the creepers upon the rail-fencing still displayed, here and there, five crimson fingers, and wayside cedars patched with shadow the pale ribbon of the road.  Rand kept silence, and his late second, at first inclined to talkativeness, soon fell under the infection and stared blankly at the fence corners.  A notorious duellist, he may have been busy with dramas of the past.  Rand’s thought was for the future.

They came into Main Street and drove to Rand’s office.  “We’ll dismiss the chaise here,” said the latter.  “I have a few directions to give, and then I’m for the post-office and the Eagle.”

“I will precede you there,” answered the other.  “Allow me, sir, before we part, to express the gratification I have felt in serving, to the best of my poor abilities, a gentleman of whom the party expects so much—­”