“I felt persuaded, on quitting him, that it was folly to expect anything from the obstinate tyrant, who would have damned himself a hundred times over to please his nephew.  However, I persevered in restraining my temper to the end; deeply resolved, if they persisted in such flagrant injustice, to make America the scene of one of the most horrible and bloody murders that even love had ever led to.

“I was, on my return home, meditating upon this design, when fate, as if impatient to expedite my ruin, threw Synnelet in my way.  He read in my countenance a portion of my thoughts.  I before said, he was brave.  He approached me.

“`Are you not seeking me?’ he enquired. `I know that my intentions have given you mortal offence, and that the death of one of us is indispensable:  let us see who is to be the happy man.’

“I replied, that such was unquestionably the fact, and that nothing but death could end the difference between us.

“We retired about one hundred paces out of the town.  We drew:  I wounded and disarmed him at the first onset.  He was so enraged, that he peremptorily refused either to ask his life or renounce his claims to Manon.  I might have been perhaps justified in ending both by a single blow; but noble blood ever vindicates its origin.  I threw him back his sword. `Let us renew the struggle,’ said I to him, `and remember that there shall be now no quarter.’  He attacked me with redoubled fury.  I must confess that I was not an accomplished swordsman, having had but three months’ tuition in Paris.  Love, however, guided my weapon.  Synnelet pierced me through and through the left arm; but I caught him whilst thus engaged, and made so vigorous a thrust that I stretched him senseless at my feet.

“In spite of the triumphant feeling that victory, after a mortal conflict, inspires, I was immediately horrified by the certain consequences of his death.  There could not be the slightest hope of either pardon or respite from the vengeance I had thus incurred.  Aware, as I was, of the affection of the governor for his nephew, I felt perfectly sure that my death would not be delayed a single hour after his should become known. `Urgent as this apprehension was, it still was by no means the principal source of my uneasiness.  Manon, the welfare of Manon, the peril that impended over her, and the certainty of my being now at length separated from her, afflicted me to such a degree, that I was incapable of recognising the place in which I stood.  I regretted Synnelet’s death:  instant suicide seemed the only remedy for my woes.

“However, it was this very thought that quickly restored me to my reason, and enabled me to form a resolution. `What,’ said I to myself, `die, in order to end my pain!  Then there is something I dread more than the loss of all I love!  No, let me suffer the cruellest extremities in order to aid her; and when these prove of no avail, fly to death as a last resource!’