"Oh, two of you, eh?" exclaimed Jack; "two of you to a man as is down. Well, as I said before, and I say again, what's the matter?" "Look here, you dog!" cried Artingale, planting his foot upon the man's broad chest, but without eliciting a movement, "I know everything about you, and where you come from." "Oh, do you?" said the fellow with a chuckle. "And so do I know you. You're a game preserver from Lincolnshire." "Never mind who or what I am," cried Artingale, who felt in his excitement as if he had never spoken worse in his life; "but just you listen to me, you scoundrel. I know how you have followed and insulted those two young ladies." "What two young ladies? I don't know anything about two young ladies." "I know that you have watched for their coming, and, knowing that they were unprotected, you have tried to alarm them into giving you money, I suppose, and so far you have escaped the police." "Ho!" said the fellow, making Artingale's foot rise and fall, as he indulged in a rumbling chuckle; "it's a police case, then, after all? Lawford magistrates?" "No, not now," cried Artingale, angrily. "Keep back, Magnus, I'll manage him," he cried; "you're not fit. I say, it is not a police case now." "Oh!" growled the fellow, laughing defiantly, "what may it be, then?" "A thrashing, you dog, for if ever there was a time when a gentleman might dirty his hands by touching a blackguard it is now." "Ho! it's a leathering is it, your lordship!" "Yes," cried Artingale, "it's a thrashing now, you great hulking brute; and after that, if ever you dare approach those ladies again--if ever you speak to them, or look at them, or annoy them, directly or indirectly, either here or down at home, I'll half kill you, and hand you over afterwards to the police." "Ho, you will, will you?" said the fellow, mockingly. "And I--I--" cried Magnus, bending down and approaching his pale, passion-distorted face to that of the great robust scoundrel at his feet. "Yes, I see there's two," growled the fellow. "And what'll you do?" "_I'll shoot you like a dog_!" There was something horrible in the intensity of hatred and passion contained in the low, hissing voice in which these few words were uttered; and as he lay there and heard them the great ruffian's brown face became of a dirty grey. But the look of dread was gone on the instant, and his chest heaved as he indulged in a mocking burst of laughter. "All right," he said; "fire away, and if you do kill me, I'll come when I'm a ghost and see you hung. There, be off both of you. This is free land. This isn't Lawford, and I haven't been taking any of your lordship's rabbuds this time." "What are you doing here?" said Artingale. "Doing here!" said Jock, musingly; "why don't you know I'm a Lawford man?" "Yes; I know that," cried Artingale. "Well, my parson's down here; I miss him when he comes away."