"Hey, hey!" cried Sir Jasper, "stop, man, stop, our business together has but just begun."
But Captain Spicer had reached the street-door.
"Look to your master," said he to the footman, "he is ill, very ill!"
Sir Jasper came running after him into the hall.
"Stop him, fools!" cried he to his servants, and then in the next breath, "Back!" he ordered. And to himself he murmured, "'Tis never he. That sleek, fluttering idiot never grew so crisp a curl nor wrote so sturdy a hand, no, nor kissed a dimple! Kissed a dimple! S'death!"
SCENE V
As he stood turning the seething brew of his dark thoughts, there came a pair of knowing raps upon the street-door, and in upon him strode with cheery step and cry the friends he was expecting.
"Ah, Jasper, lad," cried Tom Stafford, and struck him upon his shoulder, "lying in wait for us? Gad, you're a blood-thirsty fellow!"
"And quite right," said Colonel Villiers, clinking spurred legs, and flinging off a military cloak. "Zounds, man, would you have him sit down in his dishonour?"