“On my soul, sir, you do the lad wrong,” Ridydale struck in rashly. “Though his way be not your way, he is but young and—”
“Hold your tongue, John Ridydale!” the colonel cried, banging his fist down on the table beside him. “And for you, sirrah Hugh, if you have aught to say for yourself, say it out now.”
“I know not why I should defend myself, sir.” Now they would hark to him at last, Hugh was amazed to find how hot and thick his words came. “I know not what I have done shameful, unless it becomes a gentleman better to starve than to work for his bread.”
“You have only done this much, that you have bitterly disappointed me,” Colonel Gwyeth answered sharply. “For my gallant young gentleman I had thought on, those crop-eared kinsmen of mine have sent me a snivelling young Roundhead—”
“For my hair, that is not my fault,” Hugh blurted out, “and for snivelling, you have no right to put that word to me. You may ask any one—”
Colonel Gwyeth swept back one arm with an impatient movement that sent some loose papers from the table crackling to the floor. “Can you not understand now what you have done?” he cried. “When you ran away from your school you looked for me to make a soldier of you, did you not? Tell me now, how can I set over my troopers a fellow their whips have lashed?”
For the moment Hugh found no words; the full significance of his father’s speech, the totally new view of his weeks of discipline, dismayed him beyond reply. With it all came a feeling that he was bitterly sorry that the matter had gone amiss; in time he might have come to like the red-haired man, who was disappointed in him, and the red-haired man might have come to like him. Even yet it was possible he might win the colonel’s favor, if he could show his mettle, if he were only given a chance! Then he heard Ridydale venture, “An’t like you, sir—”
“Enough, Jack,” the colonel replied, with a poor assumption of a casual tone. “I want you now to take Master Hugh here and get him fitting clothes and a steady horse. By to-morrow night I shall have procured a pass—”
“What mean you to do with me?” Hugh cried out, making a step toward his father.
“I am going to despatch you back to your kinsfolk at Everscombe.”