"Well, keep your civil questions to yourself."
Chaplin was not a patient man; his long residence in the tropics, the whisky bottle, and his domestic affairs had given him a temper hardly more under control than Lawson's.
"Look here, my boy, when you're in my hotel you behave like a gentleman or you'll find yourself in the street before you can say knife."
Lawson's lowering face grew dark and red.
"Let me just tell you once for all and you can pass it on to the others," he said, panting with rage. "If any of you fellows come messing round with my wife he'd better look out."
"Who do you think wants to mess around with your wife?"
"I'm not such a fool as you think. I can see a stone wall in front of me as well as most men, and I warn you straight, that's all. I'm not going to put up with any hanky-panky, not on your life."
"Look here, you'd better clear out of here, and come back when you're sober."
"I shall clear out when I choose and not a minute before," said Lawson.
It was an unfortunate boast, for Chaplin in the course of his experience as a hotel-keeper had acquired a peculiar skill in dealing with gentlemen whose room he preferred to their company, and the words were hardly out of Lawson's mouth before he found himself caught by the collar and arm and hustled not without force into the street. He stumbled down the steps into the blinding glare of the sun.