Here the speaker gave so capital an imitation of Mr. Churbett’s accented tone in conversation that everybody laughed, including the subject of the joke, who said it was just like Hamilton’s impudence, but that other people occasionally had mistakes made as to their station in life. What about old MʻCallum sending him and Argyll to pass the night in the men’s hut?
‘The old ruffian!’ said Argyll, surprised out of his usual serenity, ‘I had two minds to knock him down; another, to tell him he was an ignorant savage; and a fourth, to camp under a gum-tree.’
‘What did you do finally?’ asked Rosamond, much interested. ‘What an awkward position to be placed in.’
‘The night happened to be wet,’ explained Hamilton; ‘we had ridden far, and were so hungry—no other place of abode within twenty miles; so—it was very unheroic—but we had to put our pride in our pockets, and sleep, or rather stay, in an uncomfortable hut, with half-a dozen farm-servants.’
‘What a bore!’ said Wilfred. ‘Did he know your names? It seems inconceivable.’
‘The real truth was,’ said Mr. Churbett, volunteering an explanation, ‘that the old man, taking umbrage somewhere at what he considered our friend Hamilton’s superfine manners and polite habit of banter, had vowed to serve him and Argyll out if ever they came his way. This was how he carried out his dark and dreadful oath.’
‘What a terrible person!’ exclaimed Annabel, opening her eyes. ‘Were you very miserable, Mr. Hamilton?’
‘Sufficiently so, I am afraid, to have made our friend chuckle if he had known. We had to ride twenty miles before we saw a hair-brush again, and Argyll, I must say, looked dishevelled.’
A simultaneous inclination to laughter seized the party, as they gazed with one accord at Argyll’s curling locks.
‘I should think that embarrassments might arise,’ said Mr. Effingham, ‘from the habit of claiming hospitality when travelling here. There are inns, I suppose, but they are infrequent.’