“You insolent dog?” he cried threateningly; and I thought he was about to strike me, but at that moment, as I stood before him with my teeth set, I would hardly have run in to save my life.
“How dare you insult Miss Carr!” I exclaimed.
“Insult! Oh, this is too much!” he muttered. Then, half-raising his hand, he let it fall once more, turned upon his heel, and strode away.
The coachman seemed disposed to speak, but the field being now my own, I walked—very pompously, I’m afraid—into the hall, Miss Carr coming out of the dining-room as soon as the front door was closed, to catch my hand in hers, and look eagerly in my flushed face.
“You have grown brave too, Antony,” she whispered, as she led me upstairs. “Thank you, thank you; I did not know that I could look for a protector in you.”
I had calmed down by the time Miss Carr had dressed; and then followed one of those, to me, delightful evenings. We dined together; she chatted of her life in Southern France, and at last, over our tea in the drawing-room, as she was sitting back in her lounge-chair, with her face in the shade, she said, in what was meant to be a perfectly calm voice:
“Well, Antony, you have not said a word to me about your friends.”
I did not answer directly, for I felt a strange hesitation in so doing; and a similar emotion must have been in my companion’s breast, for she sat there for some minutes in silence, till I said:
“Linny Hallett seems to have quite recovered now, and is bright and happy again, though very much changed.”
Miss Carr did not speak.