Lydia caught from him the tendency to sob which he was struggling with; but she repressed it, and answered, firmly, “If my servant has been guilty of the least incivility to you, Mr. Cashel Byron, he has exceeded his orders.” “It doesn’t matter,” said Cashel. “He may thank his luck that he has his head on. If I had planted on him that time--but HE doesn’t matter. Hold on a bit--I can’t talk--I shall get my second wind presently, and then--” Cashel stopped a moment to pant, and then asked, “Why are you going to give me up?” Lydia ranged her wits in battle array, and replied, “Do you remember our conversation at Mrs. Hoskyn’s?” “Yes.” “You admitted then that if the nature of your occupation became known to me our acquaintance should cease. That has now come to pass.” “That was all very fine talk to excuse my not telling you. But I find, like many another man when put to the proof, that I didn’t mean it. Who told you I was a fighting man?” “I had rather not tell you that.” “Aha!” said Cashel, with a triumph that was half choked by the remnant of his hysteria. “Who is trying to make a secret now, I should like to know?” “I do so in this instance because I am afraid to expose a friend to your resentment.” “And why? He’s a man, of course; else you wouldn’t be afraid. You think that I’d go straight off and murder him. Perhaps he told you that it would come quite natural to a man like me--a ruffian like me--to smash him up. That comes of being a coward. People run my profession down; not because there is a bad one or two in it--there’s plenty of bad bishops, if you come to that--but because they’re afraid of us. You may make yourself easy about your friend. I am accustomed to get well paid for the beatings I give; and your own common-sense ought to tell you that any one who is used to being paid for a job is just the last person in the world to do it for nothing.” “I find the contrary to be the case with first-rate artists,” said Lydia. “Thank you,” retorted Cashel, sarcastically. “I ought to make you a bow for that. I’m glad you acknowledge that it IS an art.” “But,” said Lydia seriously, “it seems to me that it is an art wholly anti-social and retrograde. And I fear that you have forced this interview on me to no purpose.”