Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 137.djvu/121

1885.] But the waves of the old man's wrath were too high to be stilled by a word from Ts'èng, and he turned fiercely on that young gentleman –

"Who are you," he cried, "that you should tell me what to take and what to leave? Because you got a degree through your uncle's favouritism, you think yourself entitled to dictate to me, do you? Nay, don't pretend to be angry; you know what I say is true, and other people know it also. Did I not hear young Mr Tso charge you with it in the street of Longevity the other day? and did I not see you, instead of facing him, sneak away like a whipped cur?"

The greater the truth the more bitter the sting. The pedlar's words cut Ts'èng like a whip, and the anger which rose in his breast, being supported by his borrowed courage, he seized the old man by the throat, and with a violent shove threw him backwards on the pathway. Having accomplished this heroic feat, he turned to his servants with an expression which said plainly, "See what I can do when I am really roused."

Catching his cue, the servants assumed attitudes of astonished admiration.

"Hai-yah," said one, "your honour's anger is more terrible than a lion's rage!"

"If he had only known the measure of your honour's courage," said the other, "he would have mounted a tiger's back rather than anger you."

Pleased and triumphant, Ts'èng turned to take another look at his fallen victim, when, to his horror and alarm, he saw him lying silent, motionless, and death-like on the spot where he had fallen. Instantly his assumed air of braggadocio left him, the blood fled from his flushed cheeks, and in the twinkling of an eye there passed through his mind a vision of himself branded as a murderer, carried before the magistrate, imprisoned, tortured, and beheaded. The vision, momentary though it was, was enough to rack his nervous temperament with fearful terrors; and forgetful of his former attitude, he threw himself on the ground by the prostrate pedlar, imploring him to rouse himself, and calling on his servants to help him raise the apparently lifeless man.

But the servants were nearly as unnerved as their master; and it was with great difficulty that the three men carried their victim into the doorkeeper's room. There Golden-lilies, who had been disturbed by the noise, found the three men helplessly gazing at the senseless form of the old man. Hastily sending one servant for cold water, and another for a fan, she took her place by the bedside, and having unfastened the pedlar's collar, turned to her husband to ask an explanation of the affair. As well as his confused mind would let him, he told his story with tolerable accuracy. Only in one place did he kick over the traces of truth, and that was when he roundly asserted that he had not used violence towards the sufferer. "I merely," said he, "laid my hand upon his shoulder, and it was while starting back in a nervous tremor that his foot slipped on the pavement and down he fell." To the servants who had now returned Ts'èng appealed for confirmation of this statement, and received from them a warm verbal support of this very new story; alas! how different a one from that in which he had gloried but a few moments before!

Meanwhile Golden-lilies was sprinkling the old man's face with