ther.'

Rose flicked her whip, and then declared she would not ride at all, and,
gathering up her skirts, hurried back to the house.

As Laxley turned away, Evan stood before him.

The unhappy fellow was precipitated by the devil of his false position.

'I think one of us two must quit the field; if I go I will wait for
you,' he said.

'Oh; I understand,' said Laxley. 'But if it 's what I suppose you to
mean, I must decline.'

'I beg to know your grounds.'

'You have tied my hands.'

'You would escape under cover of superior station?'

'Escape! You have only to unsay--tell me you have a right to demand it.'

The battle of the sophist victorious within him was done in a flash, as
Evan measured his qualities beside this young man's, and without a sense
of lying, said: 'I have.'

He spoke firmly. He looked the thing he called himself now. The
Countess, too, was a dazzling shield to her brother. The beautiful
Mrs. Strike was a completer vindicator of him; though he had queer
associates, and talked oddly of his family that night in Fallow field.

'Very well, sir: I admit you manage to annoy me,' said Laxley. 'I can
give you a lesson as well as another, if you want it.'

Presently the two youths were seen bowing in the stiff curt style
of those cavaliers who defer a passage of temper for an appointed
settlement. Harry rushed off to them with a shout, and they separated;
Laxley speaking a word to Drummond, Evan--most judiciously, the Countess
thought--joining his fair sister Caroline, whom the Duke held in
converse.

Drummond returned laughing to the side of Mrs. Evremonde, nearing whom,
the Countess, while one ear was being filled by Harry's eulogy of her
brother's recent handling of Laxley, and while her intense gratification
at the success of her patient management of her most difficult subject
made her smiles no mask, heard, 'Is it not impossible to suppose such a
thing?' A hush ensued--the Countess passed.

In the afternoon, the Jocelyns, William Harvey, and Drummond met
together to consult about arranging the dispute; and deputations went
to Laxley and to Evan. The former demanded an apology for certain
expressions that day; and an equivalent to an admission that Mr.
Harrington had said, in Fallow field, that he was not a gentleman,
in order to escape the consequences. All the Jocelyns laughed at his
tenacity, and 'gentleman' began to be bandied about in ridicule of the
arrogant lean-headed adolescent.