"Then that for you, and your King!" she shrieked; and in an excess of uncontrolled passion, she whirled her stick round and brought it down on a stand of priceless Venice crystal which stood beside her; being the same that Seigniors Soranzo and Venier had presented to the Duke in requital of the noble entertainment which my lord had given to the Venetian Ambassadors, the April preceding. The blow shivered the vases, which fell in a score of fragments to the floor; but not content with the ruin she had accomplished, the Countess struck fiercely again and again. "There's for you, you poor speechless fool!" she continued. "That a son of mine should lie down to his enemies! There was never Brudenel did it. But your father, he too was a----" "Madam!" he said, taking her up grimly. "I will not hear you on that!" "Ay, but you shall hear me!" she screamed, and yet more soberly. "He, too, was a----" "Silence!" he said; and this time, low as his voice rang, ay, and though it trembled, it stilled her. "Silence, Madam," he repeated, "or you do that, which neither the wrong you wrought so many years ago to him you miscall, nor those things common fame still tells of you, nor differences of creed, nor differences of party, have prevailed to effect. Say more of him," he continued, "and we do not meet again, my lady. For I have this at least from you--that I do not easily forgive." She glared at him a moment, rage, alarm, and vexation, all distorting her face. Then, "The door!" she hissed. "The door, boor! You are still my son, and if you will not obey me, shall respect me. Take me out, and if ever I enter your house again----" She did not complete the sentence, but lapsed into noddings and mowings and mutterings, her fierce black eyes flickering vengeance to come. However, my lord paid no heed to that, but glad, doubtless, to be rid of her visit even at the cost of his Venetian, offered her his arm in silence and led her into the hall and to her chariot. She could not avenge herself on him; and it might be, she would not if she could. But there was one on whom her passion alighted, who with all her cunning little expected the impending storm. The most astute are sometimes found napping. And the smoothest pad-nag will plunge. Whether the favourite waiting-woman had overstepped her authority of late, presuming on a senility, which existed indeed, but neither absolutely blinded my lady nor was to be depended on in face of gusts of passion such as this; whether this was the case, I say, or Monterey, rendered incautious by success, was unfortunate enough to betray her triumph, by some look of spite and malice during the drive home, it is certain that at the door the storm broke. Without the least warning the Countess, after using her arm to descend, turned on her, a very Bess of Bedlam. "And you, you grinning ape!" she cried, "you come no farther! This is no home of yours; begone, or I will have you whipped! You don't go into my house again!"