"My name is Hinchford--my address is at your service, if you wish it. Now, sir, your name--and _business_?" "I decline to give it." "You have insulted this lady, a friend of mine. Apologize," cried young Hinchford, in much such a tone as an irritable officer summons his company to shoulder arms. "Sir, your tone is not calculated to induce me to oblige _you_. If Miss Wesden thinks that I----" "APOLOGIZE!" shouted Hinchford, a second time. He had forgotten the respect due to his charge, and shaken her hand from his arm; he was making a little scene in the street, and convulsing Harriet with fright; he was face to face with the prowler, his tall, well-knit form, evidently a match for his antagonist; he was chivalrous, and scarcely twenty years of age; above all, he was in a towering passion, and verged a little on the burlesque, as passionate people generally do. As if by the touch of a magic wand, a crowd sprang up around them; respectable passers-by, the pickets of the Kent Street gang on duty in the Borough, unwashed men and women who had been seeking shelter under shop-blinds, the doctor's boy, who had been maltreated and had a claim to urge for damages, a fish-woman, two tradesmen with their aprons on fresh from business, and shoals of boys who might have dropped from heaven, so suddenly did they take up the best places, and assume an interest in the adventure. The prowler turned pale, and flinched a little as Sidney approached, flinched more as the audience seized the thread of discussion and expressed its comments more vociferously. "Punch his head if he don't 'pologize, sir--throw him into the mud, sir--I'd cure him of coming after _my_ gal--knock the bloke's hat off, and jump on it--lock him up!" The prowler saw his danger; he had heard a great deal of the mercies of a London mob, and it was hemming him in now--and, like most men of the prowling class, he was at heart a coward. He succumbed. "I never intended to insult the lady--if I have uttered a word to offend her, I am very sorry. It is all a misconception. But if the lady considers that I have taken a liberty in offering--in offering," he repeated, rather disturbed in his harangue by a violent shove from behind on to the unhappy doctor's boy, upon whose feet he alighted, "a common courtesy, I apologise with all my heart. I----" "That will do, sir," was the curt response; "you have had a narrow escape. Take it as a lesson." Sidney was glad to back out of the absurd position into which he had thrust Harriet, to draw her hand through his arm and hasten away, offering a a hundred excuses to her for his imprudence and impulsiveness.