When the Kentuckian had risen, Clarence had started from his concealment; when he now saw the eager figures pressing forward to the table he hesitated no longer. Slipping along the passage, he reached the staircase which led to the corridor in the rear of the balcony. Descending this rapidly, he not only came upon the backs of the excited crowd around the table, but even elbowed one of the conspirators aside without being noticed. His wife, who had risen from her chair at the end of the balcony, was already moving towards the table. With a quick movement he seized her wrist, and threw her back in the chair again. A cry broke from her lips as she recognized him, but still holding her wrist, he stepped quickly between her and the astonished crowd. There was a moment of silence, then the cry of "Spy!" and "Seize him!" rose quickly, but above all the voice and figure of the Missourian was heard commanding them to stand back. Turning to Clarence, he said quietly,--"I should know your face, sir. Who are you?"
"The husband of this woman and the master of this house," said Clarence as quietly, but in a voice he hardly recognized as his own.
"Stand aside from her, then--unless you are hoping that her danger may protect YOU!" said the Kentuckian, significantly drawing his revolver.
But Mrs. Brant sprang suddenly to her feet beside Clarence.
"We are neither of us cowards, Mr. Brooks--though he speaks the truth--and--more shame to me"--she added, with a look of savage scorn at Clarence--"IS MY HUSBAND!"
"What is your purpose in coming here?" continued Judge Beeswinger, with his eyes fixed on Clarence.
"I have given you all the information," said Clarence quietly, "that is necessary to make you, as a gentleman, leave this house at once--and that is my purpose. It is all the information you will get from me as long as you and your friends insult my roof with your uninvited presence. What I may have to say to you and each of you hereafter--what I may choose to demand of you, according to your own code of honor,"--he fixed his eyes on Captain Pinckney's,--"is another question, and one not usually discussed before a lady."
"Pardon me. A moment--a single moment."
It was the voice of Colonel Starbottle; it was the frilled shirt front, the lightly buttoned blue coat with its expanding lapels, like bursting petals, and the smiling mask of that gentleman rising above the table and bowing to Clarence Brant and his wife with infinite courtesy. "The--er--humiliating situation in which we find ourselves, gentlemen,--the reluctant witnesses of--er--what we trust is only a temporary disagreement between our charming hostess and the--er--gentleman whom she recognized under the highest title to our consideration,--is distressing to us all, and would seem to amply justify that gentleman's claims to a personal satisfaction, which I know we would all delight to give. But that situation rests upon the supposition that our gathering here was of a purely social or festive nature! It may be," continued the colonel with a blandly reflective air, "that the spectacle of these decanters and glasses, and the nectar furnished us by our Hebe-like hostess" (he lifted a glass of whiskey and water to his lips while he bowed to Mrs. Brant gracefully), "has led the gentleman to such a deduction.
But when I suggest to him that our meeting was of a business, or private nature, it strikes me that the question of intrusion may be fairly divided between him and ourselves. We may be even justified, in view of that privacy, in asking him if his--er--entrance to this house was--er--coincident with his appearance among us."
"With my front door in possession of strangers," said Clarence, more in reply to a sudden contemptuous glance from his wife than Starbottle's insinuation, "I entered the house through the window."
"Of my boudoir, where another intruder once broke his neck," interrupted his wife with a mocking laugh.
"Where I once helped this lady to regain possession of her house when it was held by another party of illegal trespassers, who, however, were content to call themselves 'jumpers,' and did not claim the privacy of gentlemen."
"Do you mean to imply, sir," began Colonel Starbottle haughtily, "that"--"I mean to imply, sir," said Clarence with quiet scorn, "that I have neither the wish to know nor the slightest concern in any purpose that brought you here, and that when you quit the house you take your secrets and your privacy with you intact, without let or hindrance from me."
"Do you mean to say, Mr. Brant," said Judge Beeswinger, suppressing the angry interruption of his fellows with a dominant wave of his hand, as he fixed his eyes on Clarence keenly, "that you have no sympathy with your wife's political sentiments?"
"I have already given you the information necessary to make you quit this house, and that is all you have a right to know," returned Clarence with folded arms.
"But I can answer for him," said Mrs. Brant, rising, with a quivering voice and curling lip. "There IS no sympathy between us.
We are as far apart as the poles. We have nothing in common but this house and his name."
"But you are husband and wife, bound together by a sacred compact."
