tended
to summon some brewery servant who was now away at his breakfast, it
produced no result.

"But I have no intention of staying here against your wish, Mr.
Tappitt, whether you're mad or only foolish. This matter must of
course be settled by the lawyers now, and I shall not again come on
to these premises unless I acquire a legal right to do so as the
owner of them." And then, having so spoken, Luke Rowan walked off.

Growling inwardly Tappitt deposited the poker within the upright
fender, and thrusting his hands into his trousers pockets stood
scowling at the door through which his enemy had gone. He knew that
he had been wrong; he knew that he had been very foolish. He was a
man who had made his way upwards through the world with fair success,
and had walked his way not without prudence. He had not been a man
of violence, or prone to an illicit use of pokers. He had never been
in difficulty for an assault; and had on his conscience not even
the blood of a bloody nose, or the crime of a blackened eye. He was
hard-working and peaceable; had been churchwarden three times, and
mayor of Baslehurst once. He was poor-law guardian and way-warden,
and filled customarily the various offices of a steady good citizen.
What had he to do with pokers, unless it were to extract heat
from his coals? He was ashamed of himself as he stood scowling at
the door. One fault he perhaps had; and of that fault he had been
ruthlessly told by lips that should have been sealed for ever on
such a subject. He brewed bad beer; and by whom had this been thrown
in his teeth? By Bungall's nephew,--by Bungall's heir,--by him who
claimed to stand in Bungall's shoes within that establishment! Who
had taught him to brew beer--bad or good? Had it not been Bungall?
And now, because in his old age he would not change these things, and
ruin himself in a vain attempt to make some beverage that should look
bright to the eye, he was to be turned out of his place by this chip
from the Bungall block, this stave out of one of Bungall's vats!
"_Ruat coelum, fiat justitia_," he said, as he walked forth to his
own breakfast. He spoke to himself in other language, indeed, though
the Roman's sentiment was his own. "I'll stand on my rights, though I
have to go into the poor-house."

CHAPTER XIV.

LUKE ROWAN PAYS A SECOND VISIT TO BRAGG'S END.

Early after breakfast on that morning,--that morning on which Tappitt
had for a moment thought of braining Luk