‘Don’t be alarmed, now,’ said Desmond, with his Irish blood dancing in his veins, and his heart all aglow with love of battle. ‘We’re only going to have a small civil kind of a fight, just to see how _real_ he is!’ Peebles, who had entered the room unobserved, overheard these last words, and came between the combatants, ‘Master Desmond,’ he said, ‘I’m surprised at ye. Ye’ll no’ disgrace his lordship’s house by brawling in it, as if ye were in a tap-room or a hillside shebeen?’ ‘Stand out of the way, if you please, Mr. Peebles,’ said Desmond. ‘That I’ll no’ do,’ returned the old Scot. ‘Ye’ll just be a sensible lad, as I’ve always thought ye, and tell me what’s the trouble. You’re the calmest, Master Richard--what’s a’ the steer aboot?’ ‘I warned that ruffian,’ said Richard, ‘to avoid my company. He retaliated, as you see, and----’ ‘You insulted him cruelly!’ cried Dulcie, with a heaving breast, and a glitter of tears in her soft eyes. ‘Never mind him, Desmond--come away!’ ‘Insult _him!_’ cried Richard. Peebles’ presence, and the near neighbourhood of his lordship, gave him some sense of security, and Dulcie’s obvious sympathy with the object of his antagonism enraged him beyond all control. ‘Insult _him!_ By the powers! Ask him who and what he is, and then you’ll know what right he has to be in your company, or in the company of any young lady.’ The anger half faded from Desmond’s face, and gave way to something of a look of astonishment. ‘Who and what I am?’ he repeated. ‘Sure, I’m Desmond Macartney.’ Richard repeated the name, and gave a scornful laugh. ‘And who has anything to say against me? I’m as good a gentleman as yourself.’ ‘That’s a lie,’ said Richard. ‘You’re a pauper, dependent on my uncle’s charity for bread.’ Peebles let out a slow growl of remonstrance and warning, through which Dulcie’s voice sounded like the clear note of a flute through the scraping of a violoncello. ‘For shame!’ she cried, her cheeks burning with a hot flush of generous indignation. ‘Shame!’ cried Richard. ‘If there’s any shame, it’s there!’ He pointed his finger straight at Desmond. ‘Hold your fool’s tongue!’ said Peebles gruffly. ‘I will speak!’ shouted Richard. ‘Everybody knows--he knows--that his mother was a common peasant woman, and that he is my uncle’s bastard!’ Desmond sprang past Peebles with a cry, and struck his traducer in the face. ‘Keep him off!’ cried Richard, white and reeling from the blow. ‘Curse you, Peebles, why don’t you keep him off?’ ‘Ye fool!’ said Peebles, with angry contempt. ‘Ye pitiful, cowardly fool, ’twad serve ye right if he beat the life oot of your carcase!’ Desmond, blind with fury, had seized Richard by the throat. ‘Down on your knees!’ he cried. ‘Take back those words!’ Just then Kilpatrick’s gray face and trembling figure appeared at the room door--none but Peebles saw him. ‘Take them back!’ cried Desmond, raising his fist to strike again. ‘Let me go!’ cried Richard desperately.