"Sir!" cried the Bishop, "do you mean to insinuate——"
"I insinuate nothing," cried the other and sneered. "So madam," he turned again to his wife, "this is your choice, eh? You were always a pious woman, were you not? You would like to have the approval of the Church upon your acts, would you not?" Indescribable was the sarcasm upon his lip.
"Really," said the Bishop, "I am seriously annoyed." He looked reproachfully at Lady Standish. "Madam," said he, "I came to you, as you know, in pure charity, in unsuspecting friendship. I was not prepared for this."
"Ha, ha," said Sir Jasper with a hideous laugh. "No, sir, I have no doubt you were not prepared for this. Pure, ha—unsuspecting—this is pleasant! Be silent, madam, these groans, these crocodile tears have no effect upon me. Come, my Lord Bishop, your sanctimonious airs cannot take me in. Have I not read your letter? Oh, you have got a very fine head of hair, but I know ... there is a curl missing! Ha, Julia, you should take better care of your love-tokens."
"I vow," said Dr. Thurlow, majestically, "that your behaviour, your words are quite beyond my poor comprehension.—Madam, I pity you from my heart!—Sir Jasper, sir," folding his arms fiercely, "your servant. I wish you good-morning." He strode to the door, his fine legs quivering with indignation beneath their purple silk meshes.
"No!" said Sir Jasper, and seized him roughly by the skirts. "No, you do not escape me thus!"
"How now!" cried the Bishop, the veins on his forehead swelling, and the nostrils of his handsome Roman nose dilating. "Would you lay hands upon the Lord's anointed? Let go my coat, Sir Jasper!"
He struck at Sir Jasper's retaining hand with his own plump fist clenched in a fashion suggestive of pulpit eloquence.
"Ha! you would, would you?" exclaimed Sir Jasper, and leaped at the Episcopal throat.
The next instant, to his intense astonishment, Sir Jasper found himself in an iron grip; lifted into the air with an ease against which all his resistance was as that of a puppet; shaken till his teeth rattled, and deposited on the flat of his back upon the floor.