"Very likely the old buffer we saw. But go on, please."
"His English servants went to him one day in a body and asked him to raise their wages. It was quite reasonable, don’t you think, with all the labourers and people earning twice as much as they did before the war? But they say he stormed at them, using the most dreadful language, dismissed them all, and vowed he would never have an English servant again. Frightfully, silly of him, but my father says that there’s no telling what extremes a hot-tempered lunatic like Mr. Pratt will----"
"That’s his name--Mr. Ambrose Pratt. Perhaps you have heard of him? He was a great traveller--quite famous, I believe."
"My aunt! I mean--I’m rather taken by surprise, you know; but--well, the fact is," stammered Pratt, "he’s--he’s my uncle."
"Nothing to what I’ve called him, I assure you. He gave me an awful licking once. Not that that matters, of course; we men don’t think anything of a licking; no--what I meant was I’m sorry an uncle of mine is bringing the ancient and honourable name of Pratt into disrepute. Why, he must be a regular laughing-stock. Fancy having a menagerie of foreigners!"
"But didn’t you know? Aren’t you staying with him, then?"
"Rather not. We’re not on speaking terms."
"I remember--you said you were thinking of camping out."
"Yes; and our dream was shattered. We’ve had to take beds at the inn. It’s terrible to lose your illusions, isn’t it? We all thought nobly of our fellow-men till this afternoon, and now our hearts are seared, and we’ll be frightful cynics till the end of the chapter. I don’t suppose you know him, but there’s a bullet-headed brute of a fellow in a red choker and a velveteen coat who sits on a tree-stump down the river----"
"Oh, yes," said the girl. "That’s Rush. Every one knows him. I believe he has been in prison for poaching."
"Well, it seems to be his business in life now to delude unhappy mariners; a regular siren luring them to their doom. We asked him to direct us to a camping-place. At first he protested there was no suitable spot, but his malignant spirit prompted him to tell us of a glade where the sward was like velvet, under a charming canopy of umbrageous foliage. We had just got our tent up, and I was boiling the kettle for tea, when there broke upon our solitude a man and a dog--detestable, unnatural creatures both; the dog hadn’t a bark in him--it was all transferred to the man. The old buffer barked and bellowed and bullied and brow-beat and bundled us off."