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110 What his servants were saying he could not catch, perhaps because discipline still restrained them, but the speakers outside made no attempt to modulate their conversation, which appeared now to be rising into accents of anger. He heard the word "flunkey" flung with scorn at the well-trained and quite trustworthy man who had opened the door. The word "flunkey" is the final expression of contempt which a roughly-clad working man can apply to a somewhat resplendent servant in livery, and Stranleigh knew the discussion was becoming serious when one of the combatants took to throwing verbal brickbats like this. He also thought he recognised the harsh dialect the outsiders were using, which sounded uncouth in the rarefied air of western London. Softly Stranleigh opened the door and stepped into the hall.

"What is the trouble, Perkins?" he asked.

"Why, my lord," said Perkins, who seemed flushed and rather excited, "here's a lot of navvies as insists on seeing your lordship. I'm a-telling of them, sir, that such a thing's impossible without an appointment."

A hush had fallen on the five men clustered together outside, the moment Perkins had addressed his master as "my lord." The applicants for admission ceased their clamour and stared stolidly at this unaccustomed picture of exquisite and indolent manhood before them. So this was Lord Stranleigh, they seemed to be saying to them-