There might have been another reason, assuming that he was interested
only in my identity:--this procedure would have told him; for Moore
would not have dared draw sword on the Heir Presumptive. But I have
never thought such was his idea; for he must have been very well
satisfied, by this time, that none but an equal in rank would have
acted so toward him.
And, being convinced that it was I that fronted him, he had suddenly
seen an opportunity to accomplish in open fight what his hired assassin
had bungled. It is notorious that American officers know practically
nothing of the art of fence; what easier than to drive me into drawing
on him and, then, after a bit of play, to run me neatly through the
heart. What mattered it if he were the aggressor? It would be easy to
aver he had not known me--that I had chosen to insult him, and, having
refused to unmask and apologize, had suffered the consequences of my
own rashness and bad manners.
And, even suppose no one believed his story that he did not know me.
What mattered it? One does not execute the Heir Presumptive of Valeria
for murder. True, the King might rage--and a term of banishment to his
mountain estates might follow; yet, what trifling penalties for the end
attained.
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