He took up
his hat and stick.
'I'm sorry, Mannering, that I have not been able to convince you.
I'm sorry for your point of view--and I'm sorry for your sons.'
The words slipped out of his mouth before he knew.
The Squire bounded.
'My sons! The one's a fire-eater, with whom you can't argue. The
other's a child--a babe--whom the Government proposes to murder
before he has begun to live.'
Sir Henry looked at the speaker, who had been violently flushed a
minute earlier, and was now as pale as himself, and then at the
sketch of Desmond, just behind the Squire. His eyes dropped; the
hurry in his blood subsided.
'Well, good-bye, Mannering. I'll--I'll do what I can to make things
easy for you.'
The Squire laughed angrily.
'You'll put on the screws politely? Thank you? But still it will be
_you_ who'll be putting the screw on, who'll be turning out my
farmers, and ploughing up my land, and cutting down my trees.
Doesn't it strike you that--well, that--under the circumstances--it
will be rather difficult for Aubrey and Beryl to keep up their
engagement?'
The Squire was sitting on the edge of the table, his thin legs
crossed, his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets.
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