“Stop, Ernest,” said Mr. Alston, with a shrug; “you might be taken at your word, and you wouldn’t like that, you know. Besides, it is cowardly to go on cursing at a woman.”
Ernest paused, standing for a moment with his clenched fist still raised above his head, his pale lips quivering with intense excitement, and his dark eyes flashing and blazing like stars.
“You are right,” he said, dropping his fist on to the table. “It is with the man that I have to deal.”
“What man?”
“This Plowden. I fear that I shall disturb his honeymoon.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I am going to kill him, or he is going to kill me; it does not matter which.”
“Why, what quarrel have you with the man? Of course he looked after himself. You could not expect him to consider your interests, could you?”
“If
