Will Thomas - Fatal Enquiry

It is a long drive from Newington to Hampstead Heath, such a drive, in fact, that I scarce have been there five times in my entire life. It looks prosaic enough during the day with its hills covered with East End families eating packed lunches and larking about.

In the early morning, however, it appears antediluvian; its furze-covered juttings grasping at tendrils of fog and land covered in scores of wet, glistening species of plants like the tops of a South American tepui. One would hardly believe that man had set foot there, which made it the perfect place for two implacable men to attempt to hack each other to death with good Sheffield steel at six o’clock in the morning.

They were awaiting us under a tree that cut the moving fog like the bow of a ship. From a distance I could see the carriage and Nightwine off to the side in a white shirt, hacking at the fog with his sword. It would not do to appear either too eager or too afraid, so I brought Juno up to him with a steady pace. Psmith suddenly detached himself from a tree he had been leaning against.

“You’ve arrived, then,” Nightwine commented as we alighted from our vehicle. In his white shirt, tan trousers, and knee boots, he looked every bit the military man he was.

“Was there any doubt?” Barker asked as his booted feet landed on the wet grass.

“None, I suppose. You can be relied upon to do the predictable thing.”

“It is my duty to stop you from plundering Tibet. They have enough troubles as it is. Not a single Dalai Lama has reached the age of twenty in the past fifty years.”

“All the more reason to take them under our protection if they cannot run their own affairs. But we haven’t come here to discuss politics. Psmith!”

Psmith stepped forward without a word, and I could see he was wearing a light gray suit almost the color of the mist. He opened an ancient sword case, lined in tattered jade velvet, containing French sabers of surpassing beauty. Barker must have noticed it, too, but he stood before the sword case, ignoring the weapons, and looking beyond them.

“Hello, Mr. Psmith,” he said, extending his hand. Neither of them moved until it began to become ridiculous. Psmith finally glanced over at the top of the case and that seemed to settle matters. He closed the lid with ill grace and took the offered hand, which hadn’t wavered once.

“Mr. Barker,” he muttered, and then opened the case again. It had been a little thing, but then even little things added up in battle.

The Guv took out each of the swords and examined them thoroughly for straightness and quality.

“These are very good, Sebastian. How did you acquire them?”

“I bought them from an arms dealer in Bond Street at midnight last night. They belonged to a member of the king’s musketeers. I could not resist them.”

“I’ll take this one,” Barker said. “Shall we get on with it? I’ve got a man from Kew Gardens coming this afternoon to look at my penjing trees.”

“I’ve got tickets aboard a steamer bound for Istanbul,” Nightwine said, taking the remaining sword and beginning to slash at the air. “I do believe one of us will miss his appointment.”

The sun was beginning to slash at the fog as if with a sword of its own. I could feel the dew slicking my hair and weighing down my suit and shirt. All creation seemed to be wrapped in wet cotton.

Barker slapped at a fly on his neck and looked absently at his fingers.

“Êtes-vous prêt?” Nightwine asked, after the time-honored custom.

“Oui, je suis prêt.”

“En garde!”

Both men charged at once and there was a clang of bell against bell as the swords came together and then sprang apart again. My employer retreated slowly, drawing Nightwine along with him, closing the gap, but at one point he stopped and would go no further. I noted then a small spot of blood on his collar, very red in the half sunlight, left by the insect that had bit him. I waved at one near my head and waited for the next clash, which was not long in coming.

I had fenced in school and knew a good match when I saw one. In this case, all the form went to Nightwine. Beside him, Barker, in his black waistcoat and striped trousers, looked ungainly. The saber did not seem as natural in his hand as, say, a claymore might have. It looked dainty, though deadly enough for the purpose. Had he been overconfident? I wondered. Barker had often told me to choose a weapon and stay with it. One will only get into trouble if tricked into using another man’s weapon.

There was a third clash, a parry and riposte, and this time, blood was drawn. Nightwine was the first to spill claret, slipping his blade just past Barker’s ear and cutting him near the back of the head. A second bloodstain appeared on the Guv’s collar.

I stepped forward and Psmith’s thin arm crowded me back, showing me how much power was contained in that wiry frame of his.

“A wound has been delivered, gentlemen,” he announced in a public school voice, Eton, perhaps, or Rugby. “Is honor now satisfied?”

“No,” Nightwine said shortly. “It is not.”

“What would you know of honor?” Barker answered in return. “You who have none?”

“Oh, yes,” Nightwine said, slashing at him and meeting resistance. “Cyrus Barker and his famous sense of honor. The natural, self-made gentleman of great renown.”

Barker lunged forward, whether as a tactic or in anger over the slight I could not tell. They passed each other quickly, then turned and engaged each other in the other direction.

“I contend it is you who have no honor, sir!” Nightwine continued. “You’re nothing but a lowborn Scot!”

Barker’s blade finally found flesh, glancing past Nightwine’s elbow and slicing a groove along the bicep. Nightwine, a little more sure of his skill over his opponent, had become momentarily arrogant. Each word Nightwine said seemed to sear into my memory, but at the same time, I thrust them away for now. Words didn’t matter, not when lives are on the line.

“Forgive me for speaking plainly, Cyrus. I am your oldest and best friend, after all.”

“Save your breath to cool your porridge, Nightwine,” Barker answered. “Everything that needs to be said between us was said a long time ago. And if you’re thinking you’re leaving London any way other than in a pine box, you’d best think again.”

Nightwine charged with a growl in his throat but Barker wouldn’t be moved. The sun played on their flashing blades, too fast and bright for the eye to follow. I waited for a grunt of pain, a cry, hoping it would not be Barker from whom it issued. If there’s anything I’ve learned by now, however, it is how rarely we get what we want.

“Aargh!”

The blade point pierced the Guv’s shoulder and Barker added a third bloom of crimson to his white shirt. His blade slipped from nerveless fingers, bouncing off the hard ground with a dull ring. For a second he was unarmed and at Nightwine’s mercy. The shoulder of his sword arm had been pierced. I felt the breath drawing in through my lungs, awaiting the fatal coup de grâce. Instead, Barker kicked the sword up into the air with his foot, and caught it with his left hand. When the inevitable blade came his way, he parried it and stepped back, holding the sword high over his head.

“None of your Chinese nonsense here, Cyrus,” Nightwine taunted. “You’re on English soil now. You’re merely prolonging fate, you know.”

“That’s not water spilling down your arm,” came the reply. “I’m sure we could do this all day.”

The fight continued, becoming less civilized as it went on. They were no longer gentlemen duelists, I told myself, but gladiators. Both men were bleeding heavily and their shirts stuck to their frames. They were sweating in the moist heat, and their fencing form was long gone. Will it never end? I asked myself. How long had they fought already? Ten minutes? Twenty? Why hadn’t I thought to bring a watch?