"And how dare you, Sir," answered Charles, approaching in a menacing attitude, "after seducing her from her friends, and from those who loved her, to look me in the face?"
"Madman!" replied Sir Edward, pushing him aside with one hand, while with the other he supported the now almost fainting Ellen. "Gentlemen, I request you will secure him till I place this lady in her carriage, and then I am ready to give him any explanation he may wish for."
Some of the gentlemen, who by this time surrounded them, knowing Charles, said to him: "Come away, Ross; you are very wrong: at any rate, this quarrel shall go no farther."
At this moment St. Aubyn, having placed his aunt in the carriage, wondering at Ellen's delay, returned to seek her; and astonished at what he beheld, exclaimed:
"For heaven's sake, what is the matter? My love, what makes you look so pale? Has any one dared to insult you?"
"Oh! you are there, Sir, are you," said Charles: "I know you: I saw you once, and then foretold what has happened: you are the man who must give me satisfaction."
"Pshaw! he is mad, quite mad," cried Sir Edward; "pay no attention to him; he knows not what he talks of."
The by-standers began to be of the same opinion; and, indeed, his rageful countenance, and the violence of his gesticulations, with the apparent inconsistency of his words, rendered the idea extremely probable; they therefore forcibly held him, and said: "Pass on, gentlemen, and take care of the lady: we will prevent him from following you;" while Ross's friends, supposing either that the wine they knew he had drank had affected him, or that some sudden frenzy had seized him, were amongst the foremost to secure him, especially as a gentleman who now came up said the gentleman and lady were the Earl and Countess of St. Aubyn: but Charles was too outrageous to hear that or any thing else, and called after them aloud, stamping with fury, and swearing terribly:
"Mean, detestable cowards, come back. I am not mad. Give up that wretched girl: let me take her to her father—to mine, who loved her. Mordaunt, vile, hateful Mordaunt! to you I call—Come back, I say!"
St. Aubyn turned, and but that Ellen hung half-fainting on him, he would have obeyed the summons; for he knew that name was addressed to him, and easily guessed who the supposed madman was, and how the mistake which caused his insults might have arisen; but Sir Edward said, "You shall not go back, St. Aubyn, he is mad; or if not, it belongs to me to chastise him."