ted up from the street.

The women shouted, the men swore. Some ran like frightened sheep to the
distant corners of the room, fearful lest they be embroiled in this
unpleasant fracas ... others crowded round Segrave and Lambert, trying
to pacify them, to drag the strong youth away from his weaker
opponent--almost his victim now.

Some were for forcibly separating them, others for allowing them to
fight their own battles and loud-voiced arguments, subsidiary quarrels,
mingled with the shrill cries of terror and caused a din which grew in
deafening intensity, degenerating into a wild orgy as glasses were
knocked off the tables, cards strewn about, candles sent flying and
spluttering upon the ground.

And still that measured tramp down the street, growing louder, more
distinct, a muffled "Halt!" the sound of arms, of men moving about
beneath that yawning archway and along the dark and dismal passage with
its hermetically closed front door.

CHAPTER XX

MY LORD PROTECTOR'S PATROL

Alone, Sir Marmaduke de Chavasse had taken no part in the confused
turmoil which raged around the personalities of Segrave and Richard
Lambert. From the moment that he had--with studied callousness--turned
his back on his erstwhile protege he had held aloof from the crowd which
had congregated around the two young men.

He saw before him the complete success of his nefarious plan, which had
originated in the active brain of Editha, but had been perfected in his
own--of heaping dire and lasting disgrace on the man who had become
troublesome and interfering of late, who was a serious danger to his
more important schemes.

After the fracas of this night Richard Lambert forsooth could never show
his face within two hundred miles of London, the ugly story of his
having cheated at cards and been publicly branded as a liar and a thief
by a party of gentlemen would of a surety penetrate even within the
fastnesses of Thanet.

So far everything was for the best, nay, it might be better still, for
Segrave enraged and maddened at his losses, might succeed in getting
Lambert imprisoned for stealing, and cheating, even at the cost of his
own condemnation to a fine for gambling.

The Endicotts had done their part well. The man especially, with his
wide cuffs and his quick movements. No one there present could have the
slightest doubt but that Lambert was guilty. Satisfied, therefore, that
all had gone according to his own wishes, Sir Marmadu