“Certainly—­Tompkins, touch the bell,” replied the duke.

The obedient valet rang, and a waiter entered with the breakfast-tray, which he set upon the table and proceeded to arrange.

“Take this case of pistols down very carefully, and place it in the cab, and put in a railway rug also,” quietly directed the colonel, after the waiter had completed the arrangement of the breakfast table.

“What possible use can we make of a railway rug on such a mild morning as this?” gloomily inquired the duke.

The colonel looked calmly at the questioner, and quietly replied: 

“To cover the body of the fallen man, whoever he may happen to be.  I am so used to these affairs that I know what will be wanted beforehand.  Shall we sit down to breakfast?”

Now the duke was a courageous man, but he shuddered at the coolness of his second, as he assented.

They sat down to the table and drank their coffee in silence.

Then with the assistance of the obsequious Mr. Tompkins, they drew on light overcoats suitable to the autumnal morning, and went down stairs, caps and gloves in hand, and entered the carriage that was to take them to the appointed place.

On their way they stopped at the Rue du Bains and took the surgeon who had been engaged to attend them.

Dr. Legare was a young graduate who had just commenced practice, and was eager for the fray.

He came into the carriage, bringing a rather ostentatious looking case of instruments and roll of bandages.

On being introduced by the second, he bowed to the duke and took his seat.

The carriage started again.

It was yet dark.

After an hour’s ride they reached a quiet, solitary glade in the wood of
Vincennes.

The carriage drove up under some trees on one side.

It was yet earliest morning, and the glade lay in the darksome, dewy freshness of the dawn.  There was no living creature to be seen.

“We are the first on the ground, as I always like to be,” remarked Colonel Morris, as he alighted from the carriage, bearing the pistol-case in his hands.

He was followed by the duke, who slowly came out, stood by his side and looked around.

The young surgeon remained in the carriage in charge of his very suggestive and alarming instruments and appliances.

“The sun is just rising,” said the duke, as the first rays sparkled up above the rosy line of the eastern horizon.

“And look, with dramatic precision, there are our men,” cheerfully remarked the colonel, as a second carriage rolled into the glade and drew up under the trees at a short distance from the first.

The carriage door was thrown open and the Russian Baron Blomonozoff came out—­a thin, ferocious-looking little man, with a red face, encircled by a red beard and red hair, of all of which it would be difficult to say which was reddest.