energy, he had thereupon repaired to his son's room, opened the window,
and begun vigorously to throw his pretty editions, his dainty
water-colours, his drawers full of letters, his cast of the Venus of
Milo, out on to the lawn, upon which at the moment a heavy rain was
also falling.

In the very whirlwind of his righteous vandalism his son had returned,
and, being a muscular, hot-blooded lad, had taken his father by the
throat, called him a drunken beast, and hurled him to the floor, where
he pinned him down with a knee on his chest, and might conceivably have
made an end of him, but for the interference of mother and sisters, who
succeeded at last in getting the dazed and somewhat sobered parent
to bed.

Having raked together from the sodden _débris_ beneath his window some
disfigured remains of his poor treasures, Ned Hazell had left the house
in the early hours of the morning, in good earnest for ever.

When he confided the excitements of the night to Henry at lunch next
day, and heard in return his friend's news, nothing could be more plain
than that they should set up lodgings together; and it was, therefore,
to the rooms of which Ned was already in possession that Henry's cab had
toppled with his various belongings, after those tearful farewells at
his father's door. Esther followed presently to help make the place
straight and dainty for the two boys, and having left them, late that
evening, with flowers in all the jars, and the curtains as they should
be, they were fairly launched on their new life together.

In Mike Henry had a stanch friend and an admirer against all comers, and
in Henry Mike had a friend and admirer no less loyal; but their