He hurled the photograph on to the floor, and treated it as he had treated the letter, grinding it to pieces with his heel.
“They say,” he went on, “that a man’s curses are sometimes heard wherever it is they arrange these pleasant surprises for us. Now, you fellows bear witness to what I say, and watch that woman’s life. I curse her before God and man! May she lay down her head in sorrow night by night and year by year! May her——”
“Stop, Ernest,” said Mr. Alston, with a shrug; “you might be taken at your word, and you wouldn’t like that, you know. Besides, it is cowardly to go on cursing at a woman.”
Ernest paused, standing for a moment with his clenched fist still raised above his head, his pale lips quivering with intense excitement, and his dark eyes flashing and blazing like stars.
“You are right,” he said, dropping his fist on to the table. “It is with the man that I have to deal.”
“What man?”
“This Plowden. I fear that I shall disturb his honeymoon.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I am going to kill him, or he is going to kill me; it does not matter which.”
“Why, what quarrel have you with the man? Of course he looked after himself. You could not expect him to consider your interests, could you?”