"What! up yet, sulking over the fire and waiting for a row, are you? Well, have it out; one of the men told me that brute of a horse had got home with his leg twisted. I wish it had been his neck. Now, what have you got to say about it?"
The elder Storms started up angrily, but his wife laid a hand on his shoulder and besought silence with her beseeching eyes. Then she was about to approach the young man, but one of the dogs snapped fiercely at her, and when the son kicked him, retreated, grinding a piece of her dress in his teeth.
"You had better take care, mother! The landlord of the 'Two Ravens' has had him in training. He's been in a grand fight over yonder, and killed more rats than you'd want to count. That makes him savage, you know."
Mrs. Storms shrunk away from the danger, and in great terror crouched down by the oaken chair from which her husband had risen. The old man started forward, but before he could shake off the hold of his wife, who seized his garments in a spasm of distress, Richard had kicked both dogs through the door.
"Take that for your impudence," he said, fiercely. "To the kennel with you! it's the only place for such curs. Mother, mother, I say, get up; the whelps are gone. I didn't expect to find you out of bed, or they shouldn't have come in."
Mrs. Storms stood up, still shaking with fear, while Richard dropped into his father's chair and stretched his limbs out upon the hearth. The old man took another seat, frowning darkly.
"We have been talking about you—father and I," said the old woman, with a quiver of the passing fright in her voice.
"No good, I'll be sworn, if the old man had a hand in it," answered the son.
"You are wrong," said the mother, pressing her hand on the young man's shoulder. "No father ever thought more of a son, if you would only do something to please him now and then. He was speaking just now of letting you have more charge of the place."
"Well, that will come when I am my own master."