the door).--"William Waife, beware 't is done. I'm your enemy. As for
you, too dear but abandoned infant, stay with him: you'll find out very
soon who and what he is; your pride will have a fall, when--"

Waife sprang forward, despite his lameness,--both his fists clenched, his
one eye ablaze; his broad burly torso confronted and daunted the stormy
manager. Taller and younger though Rugge was, he cowered before the
cripple he had so long taunted and humbled. The words stood arrested
on his tongue. "Leave the room instantly!" thundered the actor,
in a voice no longer broken. "Blacken my name before that child by one
word, and I will dash the next down your throat." Rugge rushed to the
door, and keeping it ajar between Waife and himself, he then thrust in
his head, hissing forth,

"Fly, caitiff, fly! my revenge shall track your secret and place you in
my power. Juliet Araminta shall yet be mine." With these awful words
the Remorseless Baron cleared the stairs in two bounds, and was out of
the house.

Waife smiled contemptuously. But as the street-door clanged on the
form of the angry manager, the colour faded from the old man's face.
Exhausted by the excitement he had gone through, he sank on a chair,
and, with one quick gasp as for breath, fainted away.




CHAPTER XI.

Progress of the Fine Arts.--Biographical anecdotes.--Fluctuations in