been at the farm."

"Well, live and learn. It has happened now."

The tone in which he spoke would have warned any man to let him alone.
But warnings which speak by implication only are thrown away on women.
The woman, having still something in her mind to say, said it.

"Have you seen anything of John Jago this morning?"

The smoldering ill-temper of Ambrose burst suddenly--why, it was
impossible to guess--into a flame. "How many more questions am I to
answer?" he broke out violently. "Are you the parson putting me through
my catechism? I have seen nothing of John Jago, and I have got my work
to go on with. Will that do for you?"

He turned with an oath, and followed his brother into the wood. Naomi's
bright eyes looked up at me, flashing with indignation.

"What does he mean, Mr. Lefrank, by speaking to me in that way? Rude
brute! How dare he do it?" She paused; her voice, look and manner
suddenly changed. "This has never happened before, sir. Has anything
gone wrong? I declare, I shouldn't know Ambrose again, he is so
changed. Say, how does it strike you?"

I still made the best of a bad case.

"Something has upset his temper," I said. "The merest trifle, Miss
Colebrook, upsets a man's temper sometimes. I speak as a man, and I
know it. Give him time, and he will make his excuses, and all will be