"I am sorry you troubled yourself so far. Ruth Annersley could have given you the answer you require." His face blanches perceptibly; and his eyes, in their usual stealthy fashion, seek the ground. "What have I to do with her?" he says, sullenly. "Coward!" says Miss Peyton, in a low tone. "Do you, then, deny even all knowledge of the woman you have so wronged?" "Take care! do not go too far," cries he, passionately, laying his hand upon her bridle, close to the bit. "Have you no fear?" "Of you? none!" returns she, with such open contempt as stings him to the quick. "Remove your hand, sir." "When I have said all I wish to say," returns he, coarsely, all his real brutality coming to the surface. "You shall stay here just as long as I please, and hear every word I am going to say. You shall----" "Will you remove your hand?" "When it suits me," returns he; "not before." Passionate indignation conquers her self-control. Raising her arm, she brings down her riding-whip, with swift and unexpected violence, upon his cheek. The blow is so severe that, for the moment, he loses his presence of mind, and, swaying backward, lets the bridle go. Clarissa, finding herself free, in another moment is out of his reach and on her way to Sartoris. As she reaches the gate, she meets James Scrope coming out, and, drawing rein, looks at him strangely. "Have you seen a ghost?" asks he, slipping from his saddle, and coming up to her. "Your face is like death." "I have, the ghost of an old love, but, oh, how disfigured! Jim, I have seen Horace." She hides her face with her hands. She remembers the late scene with painful distinctness, and wonders if she has been unwomanly, coarse, undeserving of pity. She will tell him,--that is, Scrope,--and, if he condemns her, her cup will be indeed full. Sir James--who, as a rule, is the most amiable of men--is now dark with anger. "Branscombe--here?" he says, indignantly. "Yes. He had evidently heard nothing. But I told him; and--and then he said things he should not have said; and he held my reins; and I forgot myself," says poor Clarissa, with anguish in her eyes; "and I raised my whip, and struck him across the face. Jim, if you say I was wrong in doing this thing, you will kill me." "Wrong!" says Scrope. "Hanging would be too good for him. Oh, to think you should have been alone on such an occasion as that!" "But it was a hateful thing to do, wasn't it?" says Miss Peyton, faintly. "Hateful? Why? I only wish you had laid his cheek open," says Sir James, venomously. "But of course this poor little hand could not manage so much." Stooping involuntarily, he presses his lips to the hand that rests upon her knee. "That wasn't the hand at all," says Miss Peyton, feeling inexpressibly consoled by his tone and manner. "Wasn't it? Then I shall kiss the right one now," says Sir James, and caresses the other hand right warmly.