“Dick, you passed this way an hour ago; was that breastwork in the road then?”

“Not a stick of it.”

“Then we may dare say our volunteer captain fights unwillingly.”

“How so?” he demanded, being much too straightforward himself to suspect duplicity in others.

“’Tis plain enough.  This was a trap, meant to stop or delay us, and I’ll wager high it was the baronet who set and baited it.  It would please him well to be able to say what our failure to come would give him warrant for.  Let us gallop a bit, lest we be late and so play into his hand.”

Jennifer smiled grimly and gave his horse the rein.  “I think you’d charge the Fall of Man to him if that would give you better leave to kill him.  I’d hate to own you for my enemy, John Ireton.”

For all our swift speeding we were yet a little late at the rendezvous under the tall oaks.  When we came on the ground the baronet was walking up and down arm in arm with his second, a broad-shouldered young Briton, fair of skin and ruddy of face.

If Falconnet had set the Tory trap for us he veiled his disappointment at its failure.  His face, dark and inscrutable as it always was, was made more sinister by the plasters knitting up his broken cheek, but I was right glad to make sure that my blow had spared his eyes.  Richly as he deserved his fate, I thought it would be ill to think on afterward that I had had him at a disadvantage of my own making.

There was little time wasted in the preliminaries.  When Falconnet saw us he dropped his second’s arm and began to make ready.  I gave my sword to Jennifer, and the seconds went apart together.  There was some measuring and balancing of weapons, and then Richard came back.

“The baronet’s sword is a good inch longer than yours in the blade, and is somewhat heavier.  Tybee has brought a pair of French short-swords which he offers.  Will you change your terms?”

“No; I am content to fight with my own weapon.”

Jennifer nodded.  “So I told him.”  And then:  “There was no surgeon to be had in town, Dr. Carew having gone with the Minute Men to join Mr. Rutherford.  Tybee says ’tis scarce in accordance with the later rulings to fight without one.”

“To the devil with their hairsplittings!” said I.  “Let us have done with them and be at it.”

Falconnet was removing his coat, and I stripped mine.  The seconds chose the ground where the turf was short and firm, and yet yielding enough to give good footing.  We faced each other, my antagonist baring an arm which, despite the bejeweled hand, was to the full as big-muscled as my own.  My glance went from his weapon, a rather heavy German blade, straight and slender-pointed, to his face.  He was smiling as one who strives to make the outer man a mask to cover all emotion, and the plasters on his cheek drew the smile into a grimace that was all but devilish.

The seconds fell back, but when Jennifer would have given the signal I stopped him.