“Oh, easily discouraged!” Mr. Marrapit cried.
“Oh, infirm of purpose! Back, faint-heart! Do not say die.”
Faint-heart mopped a streaming brow. “But I do say die. I do say die, Mr. Marrapit, and I damn well shall die if I go creepin' and crawlin' and hissin' much longer. It's 'ard—damn 'ard. I'm a gardener, I am; not a cobra.”
Mr. Marrapit slammed the door. George hurried out of sight; in the kitchen garden sat down to think. He was frightened. Thus far the plot had not worked well. Detectives!
He gave an hour to the search he was ostensibly conducting; when he again entered the house was more easy-minded. Employed in meditation that hour gave him back his coolness of the night. Rudely awakened, given no time in which firmly to plant his feet, securely to get a purchase with his hands before the storm burst, he had been whirled along helpless and bewildered before Mr. Marrapit's gusty agony. Instead of resisting the torrent, directing its course, he had been caught where it surged fiercest, hurled down-stream. In the vulgar simile of his reflections he was rotting the whole show.
But now he had steadied himself. He girded his loins against the part he had to play; with new determination and confidence entered the house.
II.
There was no breakfast at Herons' Holt that morning. When George, dressed, bathed and shaved, sought out his uncle, it was to find Mr. Marrapit in the study.
The distracted man was pacing the floor, a closely written sheet of paper in his hands. He turned upon George.
“In the hour of my travail I am also beneath the burden of earlier griefs. Yesterday a disastrous scene took place between us. Oaths rasped from your lips.”