His flippancy about Sara's future snapped the last frail threads of Ross's control. Without warning, he swung a furious fist at the Kafir. "You bloody-minded..."
Peregrine had a warrior's superb reflexes, or the blow might have broken his jaw. He twisted quickly and his shoulder took most of the impact, but before he could recover, Ross's second blow connected solidly in his opponent's midriff. As the Kafir doubled over, Ross felt a moment's profound satisfaction in the collision of muscle and bone.
Satisfaction was inevitably short-lived. Peregrine didn't bother to straighten up, just grabbed Ross's leg and jerked him off balance. Even as Ross hit the carpet with painful force, he rolled and dragged his opponent off his feet.
Both men were highly skilled in hand-to-hand combat, and they had sparred often enough to be able to anticipate each other's moves. The result was an intense, noisy, exhausting brawl. They rolled and pummeled each other back and forth across the library, smashing two wooden chairs and toppling the globe stand.
A furious exchange of blows sent Ross into a corner of the desk. A lamp tipped onto the carpet, and flames raced along the spilled oil. Ross peeled off his coat and tossed it over the blaze. As soon as it smothered, he returned to the fray with grim determination.
Peregrine avoided any blows or holds that could do serious damage, but Ross was less particular. Though he was not trying to kill, he wanted to harm the other man. He wanted Peregrine to feel some shadow of the pain that he had casually inflicted on Sara, and in his fury, Ross had never been more dangerous.
When both men were battered, bruised, and near the end of their endurance, Peregrine managed to pin Ross to the floor and apply a chokehold across his windpipe.
"Enough!" The Kafir's breath came in harsh, rattling gasps. "You're never going to win, I have had twenty years' head start in fighting for my life. But if this goes on much longer, one of us will be badly hurt. I'd rather it wasn't me, and if it's you, Sara will be even angrier with me than she is now. Pax?''
Enough of Ross's fury had been burned off to make him amenable to reason. Now it was time to talk. "Pax," he agreed, his voice a hoarse rasp.
After Peregrine released him, Ross lay still for a minute, his lungs laboring for breath. He ached from head to foot, and one eye was blinded by blood trickling from a laceration along his eyebrow, but nothing seemed to be broken. Painfully he rolled to his knees, stopping when a wave of dizziness almost flattened him.
His erstwhile opponent grabbed him under the arms and hauled him to his feet, then propelled him over to the leather sofa. Ross sank gratefully back into the cushions, thinking that the damned Kafir was made of steel and weathered oak. Anyone else would be lying on the floor in a gentlemanly stupor after absorbing so much punishment.
Clinking sounds indicated that Peregrine had found the liquor cabinet. After a couple of minutes he sat on the arm of the sofa and started gently sponging the blood from Ross's face.
When the blood was cleaned off, Peregrine poured some whiskey on his folded handkerchief, then pressed it against the laceration. The stinging helped clear Ross's head. He took the pad from the other man's hand and held it in place himself.
The Kafir had already poured two glasses of whiskey. He placed one in Ross's free hand, then settled down at the other end of the sofa. "Feel better now?"
"A little." Ross was pleased to see that Peregrine was going to have some lively bruises of his own, and even more pleased to see that his friend had dropped his maddening frivolity. Maybe now he would make sense. "I think it is time you were more specific about Charles Weldon's nameless vices. They will have to be impressive to justify what you did to Sara."
Peregrine slouched down, his head tilted back against the sofa, and his long legs stretched out before him. "Weldon owns a number of brothels and gaming hells, and patronizes them all," he said wearily. "His own favorite vice seems to be ravishing young virgins. He probably murdered his first wife, and he is part owner of several ships engaged in slave trading." He cocked an ironic eye at Ross. "There's more, but that should give you the general idea."
Ross was stunned into temporary silence. While he had never much liked Weldon, he had never imagined the man capable of such evil. "You can prove what you say?"
"Some of it. Not all. You can see my files if you like, though I warn you, they don't make pleasant reading."
Ross swallowed a mouthful of whiskey, welcoming its burn. Later he would want to see those files, but his friend's flat certainty was powerfully persuasive. "Are you sure about the slave trading? That has been illegal for over twenty years."
"Which is why it is very lucrative for those who still engage in it," Peregrine said dryly. "The slave ships go mainly to the West Indies and South America, where disease creates a chronic shortage of labor."