Rivaulx danced over a flower-bed, came in contact with a fence, fell over it, and uttered a howl which brought every one into the garden. He tumbled into a ditch, fortunately a comparatively dry one, and lay there, using the very worst French language. The gloomy crowd lined the ditch and listened, and wished they understood. As a matter of fact, only Bradstock and Bramber knew sufficient decent French to guess what Rivaulx said, and they shivered. In the background Titania and Ethel hung to each other and wept; old Goring remained inside sucking at an unlighted cigar. "The terrible, terrible disgrace!" said Titania. She believed the very worst at once. "Is it the marquis? Is he smitten with remorse?" Rivaulx got out of the ditch on the wrong side, and walked out into the park, where he addressed a commination service to a nice little herd of Jersey cows. After five minutes of this exercise, he returned toward the house and climbed the fence. Then he shook his fist at the others. "One of you is a _scélerat_," he howled, "a scoundrrrel! I challenge you all to fight! Ha, ha!" Bradstock took him by the arm and led him away. "One of us is a hound!" said Goby. "Yes," said the others, "yes!" They glared at each other horribly, and clenched their fists. Bob ran around them in the wildest excitement. "Look here, I say, Captain Goby. Oh, Mr. de Vere! I say, Mr. Plant, if you want to fight, come into the stables. Granny says you mustn’t fight here." He grabbed several of them, and was hurled into space at once. He finally laid hold of De Vere, who wasn’t capable of hurling a ladybird off his finger. "You shall fight Goby if you want to," he roared. [Illustration: THE MARQUIS DE RIVAULX. Anti-Semite to his manicured finger-tips] "But I don’t want to," shrieked the poet. "What shall I do? My heart is broken!" "Oh, what rot!" said Bob. "I don’t understand what the row is about. Pen said she married, and she’s got a kid. It will make her happy, for she always loved kids." But then the notice in her maiden name! Was it not awful, horrible, brazen, peculiar, anti-social, against all law? It was wicked, immoral, indecent. Behind it there must be a dreadful story. "By God!" said Bradstock, speaking at large to all but Rivaulx, who was breaking up a cane chair at a short distance, "I do think, oaths or none, that the man who is married to her should tell the duchess in confidence." But Rivaulx heard in the intervals of destruction, and stayed his hand. "Ha, ha!" he said aloud, "I love her! I am a man! I love her! What shall I do?" He threw the fragments of the chair into a fountain, kicked over a flower-pot, and ran again into the park, taking the fence in his stride. "I believe it’s remorse," said Titania. "I begin to suspect the marquis!"