“Gently, my lord,” the duke admonished the viscount. “This--this gentleman has said that which touches your honor. He shall say more. He shall make good his words, or eat them. But the matter cannot rest thus.” “It shall not, by God!” swore Rotherby, purple now. “It shall not. I'll kill him like a dog for what he has said.” “But before I die, gentlemen,” said Mr. Caryll, “it were well that you should have the full story of that sorry adventure from an eye-witness.” “An eye-witness? Were ye present?” cried two or three in a breath. “I desire to lay before you all the story of how we met my lord there and I. It is so closely enmeshed with the story of that abduction and mock-marriage that the one is scarce to be distinguished from the other.” Rotherby writhed to shake off those who held him. “Will ye listen to this fellow?” he roared. “He's a spy, I tell you--a Jacobite spy!” He was beside himself with anger and apprehension, and he never paused to weigh the words he uttered. It was with him a question of stopping his accuser's mouth with whatever mud came under his hands. “He has no right here. It is not to be borne. I know not by what means he has thrust himself among you, but--” “That is a knowledge I can afford your lordship,” came Stapleton's steady voice to interrupt the speaker. “Mr. Caryll is here by my invitation.” “And by mine and Gascoigne's here,” added Sir Harry Collis, “and I will answer for his quality to any man who doubts it.” Rotherby glared at Mr. Caryll's sponsors, struck dumb by this sudden and unexpected refutation of the charge he had leveled. Wharton, who had stepped aside, knit his brows and flashed his quizzing-glass--through sheer force of habit--upon Lord Rotherby. Then: “You'll pardon me, Harry,” said he, “but you'll see, I hope, that the question is not impertinent; that I put it to the end that we may clearly know with whom we have to deal and what consideration to extend him, what credit to attach to the communication he is to make us touching my lord here. Under what circumstances did you become acquainted with Mr. Caryll?” “I have known him these twelve years,” answered Collis promptly; “so has Stapleton, so has Gascoigne, so have a dozen other gentlemen who could be produced, and who, like ourselves, were at Oxford with him. For myself and Stapleton, I can say that our acquaintance--indeed, I should say our friendship--with Mr. Caryll has been continuous since then, and that we have visited him on several occasions at his estate of Maligny in Normandy. That he habitually inhabits the country of his birth is the reason why Mr. Caryll has not hitherto had the advantage of your grace's acquaintance. Need I say more to efface the false statement made by my Lord Rotherby?” “False? Do you dare give me the lie, sir?” roared Rotherby.