“You damned flunkie!” he panted. “I’ll have you shot like a mangy dog.” “Meanwhile I will chastise you like an insolent nobleman,” said Malcolm, who had already almost recovered his self-possession. “You dare to touch my mistress!” And with the words he gave him one more stinging cut with the whip. “Stand off, and let it be man to man,” cried Liftore, with a fierce oath, clenching his teeth in agony and rage. “That it cannot be, my lord; but I have had enough, and so I hope has your lordship,” said Malcolm; and as he spoke he threw the whip to the other end of the room, and stood back. Liftore sprang to his feet, and rushed at him. Malcolm caught him by the wrist with a fisherman’s grasp. “My lord, I don’t want to kill you. Take a warning, and let ill be, for fear of worse,” he said, and threw his hand from him with a swing that nearly dislocated his shoulder. The warning sufficed. His lordship cast him one scowl of concentrated hate and revenge, and leaving the room hurried also from the house. At the usual morning hour, Malcolm had ridden to Chelsea, hoping to find his friend in a less despairing and more companionable mood than when he left him. To his surprise and disappointment he learned that Lenorme had sailed by the packet to Ostend the night before. He asked leave to go into the study. There on its easel stood the portrait of his father as he had last seen it--disfigured with a great smear of brown paint across the face. He knew that the face was dry, and he saw that the smear was wet: he would see whether he could not, with turpentine and a soft brush, remove the insult. In this endeavour he was so absorbed, and by the picture itself was so divided from the rest of the room, that he neither saw nor heard anything until Florimel cried out. Naturally, those events made him yet more dissatisfied with his sister’s position. Evil influences and dangers were on all sides of her--the worst possible outcome being that, loving one man, she should marry another, and him such a man as Liftore. Whatever he heard in the servants’ hall, both tone and substance, only confirmed the unfavourable impression he had had from the first of the bold-faced countess. The oldest of her servants had, he found, the least respect for their mistress, although all had a certain liking for her, which gave their disrespect the heavier import. He _must_ get Florimel away somehow. While all was right between her and the painter he had been less anxious about her immediate surroundings, trusting that Lenorme would ere long deliver her. But now she had driven him from the very country, and he had left no clue to follow him up by. His housekeeper could tell nothing of his purposes. The gardener and she were left in charge as a matter of course. He might be back in a week, or a year; she could not even conjecture.