Mr. Hoopdriver looked obstinate, and, to Dangle's sense,

dangerous, but he made no answer. A waiter in full bloom appeared
at the end of the passage, guardant. "It is men of your stamp,

sir," said Phipps, "who discredit manhood."
Mr. Hoopdriver thrust his hands into his pockets. "Who the juice

are you?" shouted Mr. Hoopdriver, fiercely.
"Who are YOU, sir?" retorted Phipps. "Who are you? That's the

question. What are YOU, and what are you doing, wandering at
large with a young lady under age?"

"Don't speak to him," said Dangle.
"I'm not a-going to tell all my secrets to any one who comes at

me," said Hoopdriver. "Not Likely." And added fiercely, "And that
I tell you, sir."

He and Phipps stood, legs apart and both looking exceedingly
fierce at one another, and Heaven alone knows what might not have

happened, if the long clergyman had not appeared in the doorway,
heated but deliberate. "Petticoated anachronism," said the long

clergyman in the doorway, apparently" target="_blank" title="ad.显然，表面上地">apparently still suffering from the
antiquated prejudice that demanded a third wheel and a black coat

from a clerical rider. He looked at Phipps and Hoopdriver for a
moment, then extending his hand towards the latter, he waved it

up and down three times, saying, "Tchak, tchak, tchak," very
deliberately as he did so. Then with a concluding "Ugh!" and a

gesture of repugnance he passed on into the dining-room from
which the voice of Miss Mergle was distinctlyaudible remarking

that the weather was extremely" target="_blank" title="ad.极端地；非常地">extremely hot even for the time of year.
This expression of extreme disapprobation had a very demoralizing

effect upon Hoopdriver, a demoralization that was immediately
completed by the advent of the massive Widgery.

"Is this the man?" said Widgery very grimly, and producing a
special voice for the occasion from somewhere deep in his neck.

"Don't hurt him!" said Mrs. Milton, with clasped hands. "However
much wrong he has done her--No violence!"

"'Ow many more of you?" said Hoopdriver, at bay before the
umbrella stand. "Where is she? What has he done with her?" said

Mrs. Milton.
"I'm not going to stand here and be insulted by a lot of

strangers," said Mr. Hoopdriver. "So you needn't think it."
"Please don't worry, Mr. Hoopdriver," said Jessie, suddenly

appearing in the door of the dining-room. "I'm here, mother." Her
face was white.

Mrs. Milton said something about her child, and made an emotional
charge at Jessie. The embrace vanished into the dining-room.

Widgery moved as if to follow, and hesitated. "You'd better make
yourself scarce," he said to Mr. Hoopdriver.

"I shan't do anything of the kind," said Mr. Hoopdriver, with a
catching of the breath. "I'm here defending that young lady."

"You've done her enough mischief, I should think," said Widgery,
suddenly walking towards the dining-room, and closing the door

behind him, leaving Dangle and Phipps with Hoopdriver.
"Clear!" said Phipps, threateningly.

"I shall go and sit out in the garden," said Mr. Hoopdriver, with
dignity. "There I shall remain."

"Don't make a row with him," said Dangle.
And Mr. Hoopdriver retired, unassaulted, in almost sobbing

dignity.
XXXIX

So here is the world with us again, and our sentimental excursion
is over. In the front of the Rufus Stone Hotel conceive a

remarkable collection of wheeled instruments, watched over by
Dangle and Phipps in grave and stately attitudes, and by the

driver of a stylish dogcart from Ringwood. In the garden behind,
in an attitude of nervous prostration, Mr. Hoopdriver was seated

on a rustic seat. Through the open window of a private
sitting-room came a murmur of voices, as of men and women in

conference. Occasionally something that might have been a girlish
sob.

"I fail to see what status Widgery has," says Dangle, "thrusting
himself in there."

"He takes too much upon himself," said Phipps.
"I've been noticing little things, yesterday and to-day," said

Dangle, and stopped.
"They went to the cathedral together in the afternoon."

"Financially it would be a good thing for her, of course," said
Dangle, with a gloomy magnanimity.

He felt drawn to Phipps now by the common trouble, in spite of
the man's chequered legs. "Financially it wouldn't be half bad."

"He's so dull and heavy," said Phipps.
Meanwhile, within, the clergyman had, by promptitude and

dexterity, taken the chair and was opening the case against the
unfortunate Jessie. I regret to have to say that my heroine had

been appalled by the visible array of public opinion against her
excursion, to the pitch of tears. She was sitting with flushed

cheeks and swimming eyes at the end of the table opposite to the
clergyman. She held her handkerchief crumpled up in her extended

hand. Mrs. Milton sat as near to her as possible, and
occasionally made little dabs with her hand at Jessie's hand, to

indicate forgiveness. These advances were not reciprocated, which
touched Widgery very much. The lady in green, Miss Mergle (B.

A.), sat on the opposite side near the clergyman. She was the
strong-minded schoolmistress to whom Jessie had written, and who

had immediately precipitated the pursuit upon her. She had picked
up the clergyman in Ringwood, and had told him everything

forthwith, having met him once at a British Association meeting.
He had immediately constituted himself administrator of the

entire business. Widgery, having been foiled in an attempt to
conduct the proceedings, stood with his legs wide apart in front

of the fireplaceornament, and looked profound and sympathetic.
Jessie's account of her adventures was a chary one and given

amidst frequent interruptions. She surprised herself by skilfully
omitting any allusion to the Bechamel episode. She completely

exonerated Hoopdriver from the charge of being more than an
accessory to her escapade. But public feeling was heavy against

Hoopdriver. Her narrative was inaccurate and sketchy, but happily
the others were too anxious to pass opinions to pin her down to

particulars. At last they had all the facts they would permit.
"My dear young lady," said the clergyman, "I can only ascribe

this extravagant and regrettable expedition of yours to the
wildest misconceptions of your place in the world and of your

duties and responsibilities. Even now, it seems to me, your
present emotion is due not so much to a real and sincere

penitence for your disobedience and folly as to a positive
annoyance at our most fortunate interference--"

"Not that," said Mrs. Milton, in a low tone. "Not that."
"But WHY did she go off like this?" said Widgery. "That's what

_I_ want to know."
Jessie made an attempt to speak, but Mrs. Milton said "Hush!" and

the ringing tenor of the clergyman rode triumphantly over the
meeting. "I cannot understand this spirit of unrest that has

seized upon the more intelligentportion of the feminine
community. You had a pleasant home, a most refined and

intelligent lady in the position of your mother, to cherish and
protect you--"

"If I HAD a mother," gulped Jessie, succumbing to the obvious
snare of self-pity, and sobbing.

"To cherish, protect, and advise you. And you must needs go out
of it all alone into a strange world of unknown dangers-"

"I wanted to learn," said Jessie.
"You wanted to learn. May you never have anything to UNlearn."

"AH!" from Mrs. Milton, very sadly.
"It isn't fair for all of you to argue at me at once," submitted

Jessie, irrelevantly.