R. E. Vernède

“ Indeed, Masson, panting hard, was having his chair wrenched from him by the latter, while he dodged the squire's attempts to clinch, when he felt the other door, through which the ladies had vanished, scrape his back. It gave him an idea, and he acted on it. Letting Jenkins have the chair at full grip, which sent him staggering backwards, Masson butted the squire, turned the handle, and was through. He hung on to the handle desperately, feeling for a key. There was none. The opposition forces had got their hold, and were forcing the door open. ”

“ She looked very piteous and pretty in the light of the lamps. "You will, won't you?" she repeated.
"Certainly," said Masson; "there's nothing to forgive. Pray get in. I ought to think myself lucky to have been the young man, if it was only for ten minutes."
"Come, Dick—quick!" cried the squire's daughter.
The young man let the horse go and climbed into the car.
"Just in time, I think," he said, as Masson backed a little and slipped the car past the fallen trap to a loud chorus of "Stop, you rogue!" ”

“ You have never seen the young man before, have you? Judith——"
"Judith's a minx!" said the squire furiously.
"But she has never told a lie," said the elderly lady.
"Call her!" The squire rumbled the order, and the elderly lady fled.
"Judith, my dear, Judith!" Masson could hear her twittering to her charge as he leaned on the back of the chair which was to have served him for a weapon in case the squire had proceeded to extremities. ”

“ I imagine she'll be able to inform you that you've made a mistake, so far as I'm concerned."
Whether the squire, thus braved, would have proceeded at once to carry out the intention his hands, twitching at the whip, suggested, Masson hardly knew. At that moment an elderly lady opened a door at the far end of the hall and entered.
"Oh, Reginald!" she cried.
"What is it?" asked the squire, turning at her.
"Is this the young man?"
"Is this the——" the squire choked. "No, it isn't. This is the young man who swears he isn't the young man. That's who this young man is. ”

“ The constant striving to remain perpendicular, the grovelling with unseizable earth forced upon a man who has sat down upon it with an unexpectedness that is outside all experience, the doubts as to whether any material progress can be made except on all fours, combine to keep the attention fixed upon practical things. ”

“ Et was all along of a mistake. He, he!" and the squire's reply, snorted insultingly:
"Look here, my young man, I knew you were a rogue. I didn't know you were a cur too. Likely story, ain't it? Motoring, eh? Never seen my daughter. What? Never seen John Clifton o' the King's Arms neither, I dare say? Well, I have. John Clifton knows me, and he knows I've got him in my pocket. So when you went and ordered a horse and trap for ten o'clock to-night, mentioning—hang your impudence—that you might be wanting it for a young lady you were going to elope with, John Clifton, he came round to me. ”

“ It was at this crisis that the elderly lady again made her appearance. She came bustling into Masson's back, crying aloud, "She's gone! She's gone with the other young man! Oh, dear" (as she perceived Masson) , "what is happening? Where is my brother?"
"In there," said Masson, and let go.
"Reginald!" she cried, as the squire came bouncing through. "Stop! It's not this young man. It's another young man ”