He spoke with careless impertinence, and let himself drop on to a chair.
The others remained standing, and Mr. Daffy broke into vehement speech.
'I have come here, Charles, to ask what you mean by disgracing yourself and dishonouring my name. Only yesterday, for the first time, I heard of the life you are leading. Is this how you repay me for all the trouble I took to have you well educated, and to make you an honest man? Here I find you living in luxury and extravagance—and how? On stolen money—money as much stolen as if you were a pickpocket or a burglar! A pleasant thing for me to have all my friends talking about Charles Daffy, the bookmaker and the moneylender! What right have you to dishonour your father in this way? I ask, what right have you, Charles?'
Here the speaker, who had struggled to gasp his last sentence, was overcome with a violent fit of coughing. He tottered back and sank on to a sofa.
'Are you here to look after him?' asked Charles of Mr. Lott, crossing his legs and nodding towards the sufferer. 'If so, I advise you to take him away before he does himself harm. You're a lot bigger than he is and perhaps have more sense.'
The timber-merchant stood with legs slightly apart, holding his stick and the riding-whip horizontally with both hands. His eyes were fixed upon young Mr. Daffy, and his lips moved in rather an ominous way; but he made no reply to Charles's smiling remark.
'Mr. Lott,' said the tailor, in a voice still broken by pants and coughs, 'will you speak or me? Will you say what you think of him?'
'You'll have to be quick about it,' interposed Charles, with a glance at his watch. 'I can give you five minutes; you can say a lot in that time, if you're sound of wind.'
The timber-merchant's eyes were very wide, and his cheeks unusually red.
Abruptly he turned to Mr. Daffy.
'Do you know my idea?'
But just as he spoke there sounded a knock at the door, and the smart maidservant cried out that a gentleman wished to see her master.