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Updated: May 17, 2025
I was not the kind that is quite unable to say a good word for itself even if I was not able to lie as well as my father in his prime. In his day he could lie the coat off a man's back, or the patches off a lady's cheek, and he could lie a good dog into howling ominously. Still it was my duty to lie as well as I was able. After a time Lord Strepp was announced and entered.
I, myself, have never been able to quite quite understand him in certain ways. He seems a trifle odd at moments. But he certainly is a friend of the family." "Then," said I, "you will not be able to have the felicity of seeing him kill me, Lord Strepp." "On the contrary," he rejoined considerately, "I would regard it as usual if he asked me to accompany him to the scene of the fight."
"I would be very much obliged to you for it, Mr. O'Ruddy." With that I called the nearest guard and bade him let nobody up the stair without my knowing it. "I suppose, my lord, you are better acquainted with this house than I am; but I know a spot where there's a drop of good drink." "You have discovered the old gentleman's cellar, then?" "Indeed, Lord Strepp, I have not.
"And the top o' the morning to you, which is exactly what we are getting at this moment, though in ten minutes I hope to be asleep." "So do I," said Lord Strepp, setting off at a run down the slope.
I would stake my life that you are in the right. Say the word, and I will back you to the end against ten thousand fiends." And after him came tempestuously young Lord Strepp, white on the lips with pure rage. But he spoke with a sudden steadiness. "Colonel Royale, it appears," he said, "thinks he has to protect my friend The O'Ruddy from some wrong of my family or of mine?"
Young Lord Strepp was the first one thoroughly to collect himself. Then he advanced upon me with outstretched hand. "Mr. O'Ruddy," he cried, "believe me, we are glad to see you. We thought you had gone for all time." Colonel Royale was only a moment behind his friend, but as he extended his hand his face flushed painfully. "Sir," he said somewhat formally, "not long ago I lost my temper, I fear.
I must achieve a friend, or Colonel Royale might quite properly refuse to fight me on the usual grounds that if he killed me there would be present no adherent of my cause to declare that the fight was fair. And any how I had lied so thoroughly to Lord Strepp. I must have a friend. But how was I to carve a friend out of this black Bristol at such short notice?
"I have told my father and mother," went on Lord Strepp, "that I had some conversation with you this morning, and that conditions might be arrived at satisfactory to all parties concerned. I have said nothing to my parents regarding the nature of these conditions, but I gained their consent to give consideration to anything you might say, and to any proposal you are good enough to make."
"Enough," he cried sternly. "Back, Colonel! Back!" The Colonel flung himself sobbing into his friend's arms, choking out, "O God, Strepp! I couldn't reach him. I couldn't reach him, Strepp! Oh, my God!" At the same time I disappeared, so to speak, in the embrace of my red-headed villain, who let out an Irish howl of victory that should have been heard at Glandore.
Reflectively, Colonel Royale murmured: "One of the finest swordsmen in England." For this I cared nothing. Reflectively, Lord Strepp murmured: "My father's partner in the shipping trade." This last made me open my eyes. "Your father's partner in the shipping trade, Lord Strepp? That little black rascal?" The young nobleman looked sheepish.
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