"Who the devil asked your opinion, you impertinent young hound?" inquired Mr. Peters.
"Don't interrupt—confound you!" shouted Ashe. "Now you have made me forget what I was going to say."
There was a tense silence. Then Mr. Peters began to speak:
"You—infernal—impudent—"
"Don't talk to me like that!"
"I'll talk to you just—"
Ashe took a step toward the door. "Very well, then," he said. "I'll quit! I'm through! You can get somebody else to do this job of yours for you."
The sudden sagging of Mr. Peters' jaw, the look of consternation that flashed on his face, told Ashe he had found the right weapon—that the game was in his hands. He continued with a feeling of confidence:
"If I had known what being your valet involved I wouldn't have undertaken the thing for a hundred thousand dollars. Just because you had some idiotic prejudice against letting me come down here as your secretary, which would have been the simple and obvious thing, I find myself in a position where at any moment I may be publicly rebuked by the butler and have the head stillroom maid looking at me as though I were something the cat had brought in."
His voice trembled with self-pity.