The evening meal was being cleared away when he got down from the trap in which he had been driven from the station and strode into the kitchen. Nancy rose in order to brew some fresh tea, and he recognised her purpose.
“Sit still, Nancy,” he said. There was a changed note in his voice that only Baldwin failed to recognise. “Keturah’ll have to work for her living if she stops on here, and there’s no need for my wife to bark if we keep a dog. Get up, Keturah, and mash my tea.”
“I’ll make it myself, James,” said Nancy, as Keturah seemed paralysed by this unexpected attack; but Inman bade her be seated.
“Keturah’ll either do as she’s told,” he said, with an ugly look about his mouth and an ominous glitter in his eyes; “or she’ll find fresh lodgings along with her brother. Baldwin leaves here to-night, and I’m not very particular if Keturah goes with him—they’ve both eaten the bread o’ idleness long enough at my expense. You needn’t open your mouth, Nancy,” he went on with a rough composure that was more discomfiting than anger. “I’m master here, and master I’m going to be. Keturah can stop, I say, if she likes, and I’ll pay her wages; but she stops as servant. There’ll be no more whining and crying about ‘fine ladies’—I’ll see to that. Baldwin finds fresh quarters and finds ’em to-night. I’ve no use for him.”
Keturah’s apron was over her face by this time, but harsh words and hard looks put new spirit into Baldwin, who for the first time in all these weeks rose to his feet in a passion and called to his help the oaths he had neglected in his dejection.
It was to no purpose. Inman pushed him from him with a rough touch that was almost a blow.
“Carry your dirty talk outside, you hound!” he said. Then with a sneer that disfigured his face, he added: “I’ve taken over your motto with the business, Baldwin—‘all for my-sen.’ Both the motto and the business are good, but they’ve got to be worked with gumption, d’you see? And they’re going to be. You’re in my way now, and you’ve got to get out. I’m going to do by you what you’d ha’ done by me. Does that get past your thick skull?”
Keturah was wailing aloud, and he turned on her fiercely and bade her be silent. Nancy, white, and with lips tightly compressed, was gripping the sides of her chair, her eyes fixed on her husband, her brain busily employed in considering what was best to be done, and reaching no conclusion.
Baldwin’s rebellion had been a mere gust, and the storm subsided as quickly as it had arisen.
“Where can I go?” he faltered, as he looked dully into the eyes that were turned contemptuously upon him.