“You shall be hanged for this!”
“Anything to oblige your ladyship,” responded Giles, as cool as you please.
I felt that this painful scene could no longer continue, and said so.
“Lady Arabella,” said I, “my wife”—how Daphne’s eyes glowed as I spoke—“and I are returning immediately to Scarborough; you had best go with us; and when you have seen and consulted with Sir Peter and Lady Hawkshaw, it will be time enough to determine upon your course.”
“My course is already determined upon,” she replied; and no one who saw her could doubt it.
“And so is mine,” said Giles, now in possession of all his usual manliness. “I return to London, where I shall duly report myself to the Admiralty, and later to Sir Peter Hawkshaw; and if the lady thirsts for my blood, begad, she can have it.”
“Giles Vernon,” said I, “you have been unlucky. I can not say more, because I am in the same boat with you. But you have done nothing unworthy of a gentleman, and nothing to make either Daphne or me love you the less, no matter what befalls. So here is my hand upon it.”
We grasped hands, and, turning to Daphne, he removed his hat and proceeded to kiss her, saying to me, “By your leave.” And Daphne said to him,—
“Good-by, dear Giles.”
The proceedings seemed to fill Lady Arabella with disgust. She haughtily refused my hand to assist her into the chaise, and announced that she would go to the village of Springfield, near by, for rest and breakfast; and willy-nilly, Daphne and I had to follow in the post-chaise.