“Touch me if you dare!” growled Ratman; “it will be the worse for you and every one. Do you know who I am! I’m—I’m,”—here he pulled himself up
and glared his enemy in the face—“I’m Roger Ingleton!”
It spoke worlds for the tutor’s self-possession that in the start produced by this announcement he did not let his victim escape. It spoke still more for his resolution that, having heard it, he continued his horsewhipping to the bitter end before he replied—
“Whoever you are, sir, that will teach you how to behave to a lady.”
“You fool!” hissed Ratman, with an oath, getting up from the ground; “you’ll be sorry for this. I’ll be even with you. I’ll ruin you. I’ll turn your precious ward out of the place. I’ll teach that girl—”
An ominous crack of the tutor’s whip cut short the end of the sentence, and Mr Ratman left the remainder of his threats to the imagination of his audience.
When, ten minutes later, the tutor, with eye-glass erect, strolled back into the drawing-room, no one would have supposed that he had been horsewhipping an enemy or making a discovery on which the fate of a whole household depended. His thin, compressed lips wore their usual enigmatic lines; his brow was as unruffled as his shirt front.
“Dear Mr Armstrong, where have you been?” cried Jill, pouncing on him at the door; “I’ve been hunting for you everywhere. You promised me, you know.” And the little lady towed off her captive in triumph.
The remainder of the evening passed uneventfully until at eleven o’clock the festivities in the drawing-room gave place to the more serious business of the “county” supper, at which, in a specially-erected tent, about one hundred guests sat down.