"Are the mosquitoes attacking you, Alfred? I thought you boasted that they neglected you, bestowing all their attention on poor me!"
He was glad that the sheets of the _Madras Mail_ were concealing his face at the moment.
"Leila Baltus," he repeated slowly, after a moment's pause, in which he had succeeded in steadying his voice to a tone of unconcern. "You surely don't call that a pretty name! Shows what a griffin you are! Why, it's one of those hateful half-caste names--as common as mud, and as ugly," he added, though he was aware that he only knew one family of the name. Presently he threw the newspaper to the ground with an angry swish, and jumping up confronted Hester, saying, in a voice trembling with the passion engendered by fear:
"I'll tell you what it is, Hester! I'll not have you crawled upon by those vile half-castes at every turn--dangerous liars and thieves, every one of them! You must really seek your pleasure elsewhere than with such low associates. In fact, the way you're going on is quite compromising to me. Here am I struggling for an assured position at the bar, while you are haunting the East-Indian dens of Vepery. It isn't loyal of you! You shan't ruin me by such ongoings--that's the long and the short of it!"
He stood in front of his wife's lounging chair with uplifted arm and a fierce look in his eyes which Hester had never seen there before. She grew white as her morning robe; there was pain and wonder in her eyes, but no fear, as she gazed at him. In a moment he dropped his arm, bit his lip savagely, and putting his hands in his pockets walked with slow, unsteady steps towards the house.
Hester covered her face with her hands, and sat for some time in troubled, silent meditation. Then she glanced up with a gentle, subdued smile.
"How foolish I have been! He was so happy and kind a few minutes ago when he gave me that money, and was not even angry when I told him I had paid for the carriage hire. And then I must needs go on and chatter about the treat, though I ought to have remembered that he detested the whole subject. Poor Alfred, no wonder his temper got the better of him! Why, have I not seen my father more than a little ruffled when he was made to listen to bothering domestic things? And don't I remember mother saying: 'We must protect your father from this,' when any sudden worry arose? And here I am, her daughter, showing no more sense than a magpie! I've myself to blame for this outbreak of Alfred's, and must go and make _l'amende honorable_!"