A servant now opened the door slowly, and Learmont turning quickly on him with a frowning brow, cried,—
“An’ it please your worship,” said the man, “there is one below who would have speech of your worship.”
“Pshaw!” cried Learmont. “Use fewer words! Who is it that waits to see me?”
“He says he brings a message from the Old Smithy; but I thought, your worship—”
“You thought,” cried Learmont, making two gigantic strides, and seizing the trembling domestic by the throat. “You thought! Wretch! If you dare to think about any of my visitors, I’d give your brains to a dog, and if your tongue but wags of aught you see or hear in this house, I’ll tear it out by the roots!”
“The—the—Lord have—m—mercy upon us!” groaned the servant. “I—I—I’ll never think again, your worship, as long as I—I live!”
“Begone! And show him who asks for me to this room.”
The terrified man made haste from the apartment, and in three or four minutes Britton, the smith, staggered into the room with an air of the most insolent and independent familiarity.
His face was bloated and swollen from his deep debauch of the previous night, and his eyes looked sleepy and blood-shot. His attire hung loosely on his huge form, and he was altogether the picture of ferocity, and sensuality.
“Good morning to you, squire,” he said, as he threw himself into a chair. “By G—you are well lodged here. You haven’t a spare room, have you?”
Learmont stood with his back to the light, so that he was not in a favourable position for the smith to notice the working of his countenance, where indignation, hatred and policy were battling for pre-eminence.
“Away with this nonsense,” cried Learmont. “What brings you here?”
“What brings me here? Why, my legs, to be sure. It’s too short a distance to think of riding.”
“Money!” bellowed Britton, in a still louder voice.
“Ay; so soon. I have found a mine, and I don’t see why I should not work it, as that infernal Jacob Gray says.”
“Oh! Jacob Gray says that, does he?” sneered Learmont.
“On my faith he does. ’Tis a shrewd knave, but I hate him. I hate him, I say!”
“Indeed!” says Learmont. “He says you are a beastly sot, good Britton.”
“Ay, does he. A thick skulled, drunken idiot.”
“Even so; a mere lump of brutality—savage beast!”