It seemed, however, to increase rather than to abate, and she was beginning to contemplate recalling Cox to her assistance when to her astonishment the door suddenly opened, and Fielding himself appeared upon the threshold.

She turned sharply, her first impulse to keep him out, for he wore an ugly look.  But in a moment she realized that the direction of affairs was not in her control.  He came straight forward with a mastery that would brook no interference.

“Leave her to me!” he said, as he reached Juliet.

But at the first word his wife uttered so wild a shriek of alarm that Juliet turned back to her with the swift instinct to protect.  In an instant Mrs. Fielding was clinging to her, clinging desperately, frantically, like a terrified child.

“Oh, don’t go!  Oh, don’t leave me!” she gasped.  “Juliet!  Juliet!  Stay—­oh, stay!”

She could not refuse the appeal.  It went straight to her heart.  She put her arms about the quivering, convulsed form and held it close.

“I can’t go!” she said hurriedly to the squire.

“Stay then!” he said curtly.

Then abruptly he stooped over the trembling, hysterical woman.  “Vera,” he said, “stop it at once!  Do you hear me?  Stop it!”

He did not raise his voice, but his words had a pitiless distinctness that seemed somehow more forcible than any violence.  Vera Fielding shrank closer to Juliet’s breast.

“Don’t leave me!  Don’t leave me!” she moaned, still shaken from head to foot with great sobs she could not control.

“She won’t go if you behave yourself,” said the squire grimly.  “But if you don’t, I’m damned if I won’t turn her out and deal with you myself.”

“Don’t be brutal!” breathed Juliet.

He gave her a swift, fierce look, but she met it unflinching and as swiftly it fell away from her.  He took one of his wife’s feverish, clutching hands and firmly held it.

“Now you listen to me!” he said.  “I don’t want to bully you but I can’t and won’t have this sort of thing.  It’s damnably unfair to everybody.  So you pull yourself together and be quick about it!”

The trembling hand clenched in his grasp.  “I hate you!” gasped Mrs. Fielding furiously.  “Oh, how I hate you!”

The man’s mouth took an ominous downward curve.  “I’ve heard that before,” he said.  “Now that’s enough.  We’re not going to have a scene in front of Miss Moore.  If you can’t control yourself, out she goes.”

“She won’t go,” flashed back Mrs. Fielding.  “She’s on my side.  Ask her if she isn’t!  She won’t leave me to your tender mercies again.  She knows what they are like.”

“Hush!” Juliet said.  “Don’t you know there isn’t a man living who can stand this?  Be quiet, my dear, for heaven’s sake!  You’re making the most hideous mistake of your life.”

She spoke with most unwonted force, and again the squire’s steely eyes shot upwards, regarding her piercingly.  “You’re quite right,” he said briefly.  “I won’t stand it.  I’ve stood too much already.  Now, Vera, you behave yourself, and stop that crying—­at once!”