Read Jack Absolute for Free Online

befits my status,
     with rich gifts for all.’
    ‘Is that what concerns you?’ Jack looked at his friend. ‘Your status? I might be dead in a moment. Have you nothing to say
     of that?’
    ‘I will say just two things, Daganoweda. Firstly, this man who talked of parrots will die moments after you do. Secondly,
     concerning your death, remember this.’
    He drew himself up to his full height, arms extended before him, as if he was about to speak in the meeting lodge of his tribe
     and, in sonorous Iroquoian, declaimed, ‘“If it benow, ’tis not to come. If it be not to come, it will be now. If it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all.”’
    ‘Zounds,’ Jack muttered,
‘Hamlet
again! I wish I’d never introduced you to that bloody play.’
    ‘He is the Wise One. Wiser than you, Daganoweda. For when he was to die, he knew why. He had accepted it, like a warrior.
     Yet you still think you are to die for a woman. And I think you are wrong.’
    Jack had little time to consider his friend’s words. Tarleton had taken his position at one end of the rectangle of snow,
     tamped down by those who’d come early to enjoy the fight. He stood there, swishing his sword, still clad only in his linen
     shirt.
    ‘Your coat, Jack?’ Sheridan already held his cloak.
    ‘No,’ Jack sniffed. ‘I don’t mind being killed – but I’ll be damned if I’m going to catch a cold.’
    He stepped up to his mark. They saluted the President, their opponent’s Seconds, each other. Then their two swords rose, ends
     meeting with the faintest of chimes. It was like the toll of some far-away bell, a stirring of consciousness, and it instantly
     cleared the very last effects of cognac from Jack’s head.
    His plan was simple. He assumed, from their previous dealings, that his opponent would be mad in assault, contemptuous of
     defence, that he would fall like a storm upon Jack’s artfully casual resistance. Fire and fury was what was expected from
     youth; coolness and calm the prerogative of age and experience.
    Yet in the opening exchanges, the younger man refused to conform to Jack’s prejudice; was not tempted into an extended lunge,
     did not respond to the first of Jack’s feints when he left his weapon slightly out of true, in tierce. He parried and riposted
     and parried again in the least exerting of ways.
    Damn him
, thought Jack, taking a breath,
the bastard’s come to fence.
    Tarleton was obviously conscientious in his attendance at Master Angelo’s Academy in the Haymarket. Though Jack had himself
     been one of the Italian’s foremost pupils, it had been fifteen years since he’d last ascended those steep stairs – and the
     small sword required a subtlety of mind, a strength and nimbleness of wrist, and continual practice. The last thing he wanted
     was a fencing bout.
    The fighters separated, sword tips an inch apart, the preliminaries ended. Each had a sense of the other. Jack breathed, tried
     to focus on his plan. A glimpse of blood was all that was needed for honour to be satisfied, to enable him to walk away. If
     Tarleton would not be drawn into rashness, there were other ways to attain this end. A good scratch would do it. He just had
     to set about inflicting one.
    Yet as Jack considered, his opponent began on stratagems of his own. A dozen rapid passes, a flank temptingly exposed; Jack
     lured, over-lunging. His rear ankle bent instead of staying sole-flat to the ground, requiring an extra second to restore
     his balance; and in that small moment, Tarleton circular parried hard to the right. Jack’s thigh was stretched out, exposed,
     his weapon too extended for protection; and the spectators who knew their sword-work, waiting for the swift strike at thigh
     that would at least wound but could kill if the artery were pierced, caught their breath.
    The moment passed. Tarleton did not move; Jack regained his balance, dropped his point, and slashed. Since the small sword
     has no cutting edge, all