“I’m very glad you have come.”
“Thank ye, my dear, thank ye. I’m rather rough, but you must not mind that. Been hunting, and gold-digging, and living in camp. Soon rub off the corners. It’s very nice and kind of you to speak so well as you have.”
He took the hand she held out, drew it through his arm, and kept it in quiet possession, as he turned with an insolent look of triumph upon Saul.
“Now, Mr What’s-your-name, do you live here?”
“No,” said Saul sharply, and he returned the other’s defiant look, and felt hard pressed to keep back his jealous rage as he saw Gertrude rest calmly, with her hand in that of the new-comer. “No—not yet,” he added to himself.
“Well, then, my dear sir, as I do—in future—and as I have come a very long journey, and am tired and hungry, and want to talk to miss here, perhaps you’ll be good enough to take your hat and get out.”
Saul’s eyes flashed, and his cheeks became of an uglier pallor, as he listened to this speech, which bore a strong resemblance to that of one of the late Mr Chucks, the boatswain, of “Peter Simple” fame. For it was all refinement at the beginning, and wandered off into argot that was the very reverse.
“I am not accustomed to be ordered out of this house, sir,” said Saul in a low voice, full of suppressed rage; “and I refuse to go until I have seen your credentials.”
“What!”
“And I’m not going to be bullied,” said Saul. “Your cowboy manners don’t frighten me; and if it wasn’t for the lady here, whom, in spite of her preference for an utter stranger, I am bound to protect, I’d just take you and show you how to behave in an English house.”