told him what had
passed.

Mr. Henry smiled to himself; a grimmer smile I never witnessed. "You did
exactly well," said he. "He shall drink his Jessie Broun to the dregs."
And then, spying the Master outside, he opened the window, and, crying
to him by the name of Mr. Bally, asked him to step up and have a word.

"James," said he, when our persecutor had come in and closed the door
behind him, looking at me with a smile, as if he thought I was to be
humbled, "you brought me a complaint against Mr. Mackellar, into which I
have inquired. I need not tell you I would always take his word against
yours; for we are alone, and I am going to use something of your own
freedom. Mr. Mackellar is a gentleman I value; and you must contrive, so
long as you are under this roof, to bring yourself into no more
collisions with one whom I will support at any possible cost to me or
mine. As for the errand upon which you came to him, you must deliver
yourself from the consequences of your own cruelty, and none of my
servants shall be at all employed in such a case."

"My father's servants, I believe," said the Master.

"Go to him with this tale," said Mr. Henry.

The Master grew very white. He pointed at me with his finger. "I want
that man discharged," he said.

"He shall not be," said Mr. Henry.

"You shall pay pretty dear for this," says the Master.

"I have paid so dear already for a wicked brother," said Mr. Henry,
"that I am bankrupt even of fears. You have no place left where you can
strike me."

"I will show you about that," says the Master, and went softly away.

"What will he do next, Mackellar?" cries Mr. Henry.

"Let me go away," said I. "My dear patron, let me go away; I am but the
beginning of fresh sorrows."

"Would you leave me quite alone?" said he.

* * * * *

We were not long in suspense as to the nature of the new assault. Up to
that hour the Master had played a very close game with Mrs. Henry;
avoiding pointedly to be alone with her, which I took at the time for an
effect of decency, but now think to have been a most insidious art;
meeting her, you may say, at meal-time only; and behaving, when he did
so, like an affectionate brother. Up to that hour, you may say he had
scarce directly interfered between Mr. Henry and his wife; except in so
far as he had manoeuvred the one quite forth from the good graces of the
other. Now all that was to be changed; but whether really in