Almost the first visit Clive paid, when he was allowed to venture out, was to Bittermeads; and Dunn, returning one afternoon from an errand, found him established on the lawn in the company of Ella, and looking little the worse for his adventure.
He and Ella seemed to be talking very animatedly, and Dunn took the opportunity to busy himself with some gardening work not far away, so that he could watch their behaviour.
He told himself it was necessary he should know in what relation they stood to each other, and as he heard them chatting and laughing together with great apparent friendliness and enjoyment, he remembered with considerable satisfaction how he had already broken one rib of Clive's, and he wished very much for an opportunity to break another.
For, without knowing why, he was beginning to conceive an intense dislike for Clive; and, also, it did not seem to him quite good taste for Ella to sit and chat and laugh with him so readily.
“But we were told,” he caught a stray remark of Ella's, “that it was a gang of at least a dozen that attacked you.”
“No,” answered Clive reluctantly. “No, I think there was only one. But he had a grip like a bear.”
“He must have been very strong,” remarked Ella thoughtfully.
“I would give fifty pounds to meet him again, and have it out in the light, when one could see what one was doing,” declared Clive with great vigour.
“Oh, you would, would you?” muttered Dunn to himself. “Well, one of these days I may claim that fifty.”
He looked round at Clive as he thought this, and Clive noticed him, and said: