’Only for a moment; a moment or two.  I cannot endure him.  I am sure I have reason.’

Rosamund flushed exceedingly red.  The visit to Dr. Shrapnel’s house was her secret, and the worming of it out made her feel guilty, and that feeling revived and heated her antipathy to the Radical doctor.

‘What reason?’ said Mr. Romfrey, freshening at her display of colour.

She would not expose Nevil to the accusation of childishness by confessing her positive reason, so she answered, ’The man is a kind of man . . .  I was not there long; I was glad to escape.  He . . .’ she hesitated:  for in truth it was difficult to shape the charge against him, and the effort to be reticent concerning Nevil, and communicative, now that he had been spoken of, as to the detested doctor, reduced her to some confusion.  She was also fatally anxious to be in the extreme degree conscientious, and corrected and modified her remarks most suspiciously.

‘Did he insult you, ma’am?’ Mr. Romfrey inquired.

She replied hastily, ’Oh no.  He may be a good man in his way.  He is one of those men who do not seem to think a woman may have opinions.  He does not scruple to outrage those we hold.  I am afraid he is an infidel.  His ideas of family duties and ties, and his manner of expressing himself, shocked me, that is all.  He is absurd.  I dare say there is no harm in him, except for those who are so unfortunate as to fall under his influence—­and that, I feel sure, cannot be permanent.  He could not injure me personally.  He could not offend me, I mean.  Indeed, I have nothing whatever to say against him, as far as I . . .’

‘Did he fail to treat you as a lady, ma’am?’

Rosamund was getting frightened by the significant pertinacity of her lord.

‘I am sure, sir, he meant no harm.’

‘Was the man uncivil to you, ma’am?’ came the emphatic interrogation.

She asked herself, had Dr. Shrapnel been uncivil toward her?  And so conscientious was she, that she allowed the question to be debated in her mind for half a minute, answering then, ’No, not uncivil.  I cannot exactly explain . . . .  He certainly did not intend to be uncivil.  He is only an unpolished, vexatious man; enormously tall.’

Mr. Romfrey ejaculated, ‘Ha! humph!’

His view of Dr. Shrapnel was taken from that instant.  It was, that this enormously big blustering agitator against the preservation of birds, had behaved rudely toward the lady officially the chief of his household, and might be considered in the light of an adversary one would like to meet.  The size of the man increased his aspect of villany, which in return added largely to his giant size.  Everard Romfrey’s mental eye could perceive an attractiveness about the man little short of magnetic; for he thought of him so much that he had to think of what was due to his pacifical disposition (deeply believed in by him) to spare himself the trouble of a visit to Bevisham.