compound. Was that a thing to do in a respectable hotel? The cheek, the
indecency, the impudence, the atrocity! Vagabond, impostor, swindler,
ruffian, schwein-hund!

He had seized Davidson by a button of his coat, detaining him in
the doorway, and exactly in the line of Mrs. Schomberg's stony gaze.
Davidson stole a glance in that direction and thought of making some
sort of reassuring sign to her, but she looked so bereft of senses, and
almost of life, perched up there, that it seemed not worth while.
He disengaged his button with firm placidity. Thereupon, with a last
stifled curse, Schomberg vanished somewhere within, to try and compose
his spirits in solitude. Davidson stepped out on the veranda. The party
of customers there had become aware of the explosive interlude in the
doorway. Davidson knew one of these men, and nodded to him in passing;
but his acquaintance called out:

"Isn't he in a filthy temper? He's been like that ever since."

The speaker laughed aloud, while all the others sat smiling. Davidson
stopped.

"Yes, rather." His feelings were, he told us, those of bewildered
resignation; but of course that was no more visible to the others than
the emotions of a turtle when it withdraws into its shell.

"It seems unreasonable," he murmured thoughtfully.

"Oh, but they had a scrap!" the other said.

"What do you mean? Was there a fight!--a fight with Heyst?" asked