this a hint? or only an excuse? In either case it was high time, if
he still refused to speak out, that I should set him the example.

"You have given me some curious information," I said, "on the subject of
fighting with the fists; and you have made me understand the difference
between 'fair hitting' and 'foul hitting'. Are you hitting fair now? Very
likely I am mistaken--but you seem to me to be trying to prevent my
accepting your master's invitation."

He pulled off his hat in a hurry.

"I beg your pardon, sir; I won't detain you any longer. If you will allow
me, I'll take my leave."

"Don't go, Mr. Gloody, without telling me whether I am right or wrong. Is
there really some objection to my coming to tea tomorrow?"

"Quite a mistake, sir," he said, still in a hurry. "I've led you wrong
without meaning it--being an ignorant man, and not knowing how to express
myself. Don't think me ungrateful, Mr. Roylake! After your kindness to
me, I'd go through fire and water for you--I would!"

His sunken eyes moistened, his big voice faltered. I let him leave me, in
mercy to the strong feeling which I had innocently roused. But I shook
hands with him first. Yielding to one of my headlong impulses? Yes. And
doing a very indiscreet thing? Wait a little--and we shall see.

CHAPTER XII

WARNED FOR THE LAST TIME!

My loyalty towards the afflicted man, whose friendly advances I had seen
good reason to return, was in no sense shaken. His undeserved
misfortunes, his manly appeal to me at the spring, his hopeless
attachment to the beautiful girl whose aversion towards him I had
unhappily encouraged, all pleaded with me in his favour. I had accepted
his invitation; and I had no other engagement to claim me: it would have
been an act of meanness amounting to a confession of fear, if I had sent
an excuse. Still, while Cristel's entreaties and Cristel's influence had
failed to shake me, Gloody's strange language and Gloody's
incomprehensible conduct had troubled my mind. I felt vaguely uneasy;
irritated by my own depression of spirits. If I had been a philosopher, I
should have recognized the symptoms of a very common attack of a very
widely-spread moral malady. The meanest of all human infirmities is also
the most universal; and the name of it is Self-esteem.

It is perhaps only right to add that my patience had been tried by the
progress of domestic events, which affected Lady Lena and myself--viewed
as victims.

Calling, w