There was a lurid calm about the old man's face as he asked this
question that was very dreadful in its intensity. Under the shadow of
his thick black eyebrows, gleams of light glinted and flickered in the
expanded pupils, as before the outburst of a tempest the forked
lightning flickers in the belly of the cloud. His voice too was
constrained and harsh.

Owing to the position of his father's head, Philip could not see this
play of feature, but he heard the voice and thought that it meant
mischief. He had but a second to decide between confession and the lie
that leaped to his lips. An inward conviction told him that his father
was not long for this world, was it worth while to face his anger when
matters might yet be kept dark till the end? The tone of the voice--
ah! how he mistook its meaning--deceived him. It was not, he thought,
possible that his father could know anything. Had he possessed a
little more knowledge of the world, he might have judged differently.

"Married, no, indeed; what put that idea into your head?" And he
laughed outright.

Presently he became aware that his father had risen and was
approaching towards him. Another moment and a hand of iron was laid
upon his shoulder, the awful eyes blazed into his face and seemed to
pierce him through and through, and a voice that he could not have
recognized hissed into his ear--

"You unutterable liar, you everlasting hound, your wife is at this
moment in this house."