The very sight of the straight, young figure had quenched the fire of his wrath.  Confound the boy!  Did he think he could insult him as he had insulted him only that afternoon and then twist him round his little finger?  He would have it out with him presently.  He would have the truth and no compromise, if he had to wring it out of him.  He would—­Again the vision of those strong young shoulders, with red stripes crossing their gleaming white surface, rose before Sir Beverley.  He swore a strangled oath.  No, he hadn’t meant to punish the boy to that extent, his infernal impudence notwithstanding.  It wasn’t the first time he had thrashed him, and, egad, it mightn’t be the last.  But he hadn’t meant to administer quite such a punishment as that.  It was decent of the young rascal not to sulk after it, though he wasn’t altogether sure that he approved of the light fashion with which Piers had elected to treat the whole episode.  It looked as if he had not wholly taken to heart the lesson Sir Beverley had intended to convey, and if that were the case—­again Sir Beverley swore deep in his soul—­he was fully equal to repeating it, ay, and again repeating it, until the youngster came to heel.  He never had endured any nonsense from Piers, and, by Gad, he never would!

With these reflections he stumped downstairs, and seated himself on the black, oaken settle in the hall to await the boy’s advent.

The fire blazed cheerily, flinging ruddy gleams upon the shining suits of armour, roaring up the chimney in a sheet of flame.  Sir Beverley sat facing the stairs, the grim lines hardened to implacability about his mouth, his eyes fixed in a stare that had in it something brutal.  He was seeing again that slim, straight figure of womanhood standing in his path, with arms outstretched, and white, determined face upraised, barring the way.

“Curse her!” he growled.  “Curse ’em all!”

The vision grew before his gaze of hate; and now she was no longer standing between him and a mere, defenceless animal.  But there, on his own stairs, erect and fearless, she withstood him, while behind her, descending with a laugh on his lips and worship in his eyes, came Piers.

The stone-grey eyes became suffused; for a few, whirling moments of bewilderment and fury, they saw all things red.  Then, gradually, the mist cleared, and the old man dropped back in a lounging posture with an ugly sound in his throat that was like a snarl.  Doubtless that was her game; doubtless—­doubtless!  He had always known that a day would come when something of the kind would happen.  Piers was young, wealthy, handsome,—­a catch for any woman; but—­fiercely he swore it—­he should fall a prey to no schemer.  When he married—­as marry eventually he must—­he should make an alliance of which any man might be proud.  The Evesham blood should mix with none but the highest.  In Piers he would see the father’s false step counteracted.  He thanked Heaven that he had never been able to detect in the boy any trace of the piece of cheap prettiness that had given him birth.  He might have been his own son, son of the woman who had been the rapture and the ruin of his life.  There were times when Sir Beverley almost wished he had been, albeit in the bitterness of his soul he had never had any love for the child she had borne him.