“I forbid you,” he cried, facing him savagely, “to drag that child’s name before this company!”
“Didn’t you ask him to sit down?” growled fat Billy Adams. “What in the devil did you ask him to sit down for?”
“He’d have sat down anyway, old chap,” declared Teddy. “I know his kind. He’s a pest. You might as well be polite to a gorilla.”
“I’d like to see him try that trick in a club in Paris,” put in Lamont. “He’d have a duel on his hands in twenty-four hours. Really, you’ve got some astounding people in America—damned if you haven’t. All his tommyrot about that kid. You’d have thought I’d abducted her—” at which they all roared.
Enoch still sat before the deserted round table—alone, grim, white, and silent, the muscles of his jaw twitching, both fists clenched in his trousers pockets.
In this attitude Teddy Dryer, strolling nervously back into the big front room, found him. He was muttering to himself, his legs outstretched, sunk low in his chair, oblivious of Teddy’s presence, until that thin young man slipped into the empty chair at his elbow and bravely ventured the part of a peacemaker. It would not be fair to say that Teddy was drunk, and as much of an exaggeration to infer that he was anything like half-seas-over, or well in his cups, but there was no gainsaying that his British pronunciation, gleaned from several trips to London, had lost its usual clearness and purity, and that his small eyes were as bright as a squirrel’s.
“Mosh distressing, don’t yer know,” he began courageously, in his high-keyed, nervous little voice. “Hadn’t slight-tush idea—I mean to say—not slight-tush idea—you and he didn’t hit it off together. Mosh shocking ordeal for all of ush. Rather.”
Enoch did not turn his head or reply.
“Awf’ly upset ’bout it—Pierre—’pon my word he is. Horribly angry—old chap. Went off ripping mad—sensitive, yer know—slight-tush thing offends him. Awf’ly clever, Pierre—I say—you were mighty rough on Lamont. Rather. Besh sort in the world. Poor old Pierre wouldn’t hurt a fly. Ought to really ’polgize—good idea—’polgize—eh?——”