" He
had borrowed his traveling expenses from Kerfoot, who in turn had
borrowed them from Miss Nancy, keeping the impending duel carefully
concealed from that dear lady, and reading only such part of the
colonel's letter as referred to the drawing up of some important papers
in which he was to figure as chief executor.
"Late? No, Tom," said the colonel; "but the scoundrel has run to cover.
We are watchin' his hole."
"You sholy don't tell me he's got away, Colonel?" replied Major Yanccy.
"What could I do, Yancey? He hasn't had the decency to answer my
letter."
Yancey, however, on hearing more fully the facts, clung to the hope
that the Yankee would yet be smoked out.
"I of co'se am not familiar with the code as practiced Nawth--perhaps
these delays are permis'ble; but in my county a challenge is a ball,
and a man is killed or wounded ez soon ez the ink is dry on the papah.
The time he has to live is only a mattah of muddy roads or convenience
of seconds. Is there no way in which this can be fixed? I doan't like
to return home without an effo't bein' made.
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