“Nonsense!” cried the old man, angrily. “Do you think that I’m in my dotage, Jack? It’s whiskey. I can smell it!”
“Oh!” Ralston paused. “It’s true—on my way here, I began to drink something and then put it down.”
“Hm!” Robert Lauderdale snorted and looked at him. “It’s none of my business how many cocktails you drink, I suppose—and it’s natural that you should wish to celebrate the wedding day. Might drink wine, though, like a gentleman,” he added audibly.
Again Ralston felt that sharp thrust of pain which a man feels under a wholly unjust accusation brought against him when he has been doing his best and has more than partially succeeded. The fiery temper—barely under control when he had entered the house—broke out again.
“If you’ve sent for me to lecture me on my habits, I shall go,” he said, moving as though about to rise.
“I didn’t,” answered the old gentleman, with flashing eyes. “I asked you to come here on a matter of business—and you’ve come smelling of whiskey and flying into a passion at everything I say—and I tell you—pah! I can smell it here!”
He took a cigar from the table and lit it hastily. Meanwhile Ralston rose to his feet. He evidently had no intention of quarrelling with his uncle unnecessarily, but the repeated insult stung him past endurance. The old man looked up, with the cigar between his teeth, and still holding the match at the end of it. With the other hand he took a bit of paper from the table and held it out towards Ralston.
“That’s what I sent for you about,” he said.
Ralston turned suddenly and faced him.
“What is it?” he asked sharply.