"Damnation!" he muttered, fumbling for another cigar.
His charities already had been attended to for the year. That portion of his income devoted to such things was now entirely used up. But he remained uneasily aware that the portion reserved for further acquisition of Americana – books, prints, pictures, early American silver, porcelains, furniture, was still intact for the new year now beginning.
That was his only refuge from loneliness and the ever-living grief – the plodding hunt for such things and the study connected with this pursuit. Except for his son – his ruling passion – he had no other interest, now that his wife was dead – nothing that particularly mattered to him in life except this collecting of Americana.
And now his son had gone away again. The day had to be filled – filled rather quickly, too; for the parting still hurt cruelly, and with a dull persistence that he had not yet shaken off. He must busy himself with something. He'd go out again presently, and mouse about among musty stacks of furniture "in the rough." Then he'd prowl through auction rooms and screw a jeweller's glass into his right eye and pore over mezzotints.
He allowed himself just so much to spend on Americana; just so much to spend on his establishment, so much to invest, so much to give to charity —
"Damnation!" he repeated aloud.
It was the last morning of the exhibition at the Christensen Galleries of early American furniture. That afternoon the sale was to begin. He had not had time for preliminary investigation. He realized the importance of the collection; knew that his friends would be there in force; and hated the thought of losing such a chance.
Turning the leaves or his newspaper for the advertisement, he found himself again confronted by the columns containing the dreary "Hundred Neediest Cases." And against every inclination he re-read the details of Case 119.
Odd, he thought to himself angrily, that there was nobody in the city to contribute the few dollars necessary to this little girl. The case in question required only fifty dollars. Fifty dollars meant a home, possibly moral salvation, to this child with her winning disposition and unruly ways.
He read the details again, more irritated than ever, yet grimly interested to note that, as usual, it is the very poor with many burdens who help the poor. This carpenter, living probably in a tenement, with a wife, an unborn baby, and a herd of squalling children to support, had still found room for another little waif, whose drug-sodden parents had been kind to her only by dying.
John Cleland turned the page, searched for the advertisement of the Christensen Galleries, discovered it, read it carefully. There were some fine old prints advertised to be sold. His hated rivals would be there – beloved friends yet hated rivals in the endless battle for bargains in antiquities.
When he got into his car a few minutes later, he told the chauffeur to drive to Christensen's and drive fast. Halfway there, he signalled and spoke through the tube:
"Where is the United Charities Building? Where? Well, drive there first."
"Damn!" he muttered, readjusting himself in the corner under the lynx robe.
CHAPTER II
"Would you care to go there and see the child for yourself, Mr. Cleland? A few moments might give you a much clearer idea of her than all that I have told you," suggested the capable young woman to whom he had been turned over in that vast labyrinth of offices tenemented by the "United Charities Organizations of Manhattan and the Four Boroughs, Inc."
John Cleland signed the cheque which he had filled in, laid it on the desk, closed his cheque-book, and shook his head.
"I'm a busy man," he said briefly.
"Oh, I'm sorry! I wish you had time to see her for a moment. You may obtain permission through the Manhattan Charities Concern, a separate organization, winch turns over certain cases to the excellent child-placing agency connected with our corporation."
"Thank you; I haven't time."
"Mr. Chiltern Grismer would be the best man to see – if you had time."
"Thank you."
There was a chilly silence; Cleland stood frowning at space, wrapped in gloomy preoccupation.
"But," added the capable young woman, wistfully, "if you are so busy that you have no time to bother with this case personally – "
"I have time," snapped Cleland, turning red. For the man was burdened with the inconvenient honesty of his race – a sort of tactless truthfulness which characterized all Clelands. He said:
"When I informed you that I'm a busy man, I evidently but unintentionally misled you. I'm not in business. I have time. I simply don't wish to go into the slums to see somebody's perfectly strange offspring."
The amazed young woman listened, hesitated, then threw back her pretty head and laughed:
"Mr. Cleland, your frankness is most refreshing! Certainly there is no necessity for you to go if you don't wish to. The little girl will be most grateful to you for this generous cheque, and happy to be relieved of the haunting terror that has made her almost ill at the prospect of an orphanage. The child will be beside herself with joy when she gets word from us that she need not lose the only home and the only friends she has ever known. Thank you – for little Stephanie Quest."
"What did the other people do to her?" inquired John Cleland, buttoning his gloves and still scowling absently at nothing.
"What people?"
"The ones who – her parents, I mean. What was it they did to her?"
"They were dreadfully inhuman – "
"What did they do to the child? Do you know?"
"Yes, I know, Mr. Cleland. They beat her mercilessly when they happened to be crazed by drugs; they neglected her when sober. The little thing was a mass of cuts and sores and bruises when we investigated her case; two of her ribs had been broken, somehow or other, and were not yet healed – "
"Oh, Lord!" he interrupted sharply. "That's enough of such devilish detail! – I beg your pardon, but such things – annoy me. Also I've some business that's waiting – or pleasure, whichever you choose to call it – " He glanced at his watch, thinking of the exhibition at Christensen's, and the several rival and hawk-like amateurs who certainly would be prowling around there, deriding him for his absence and looking for loot.
"Where does that child live?" he added carelessly, buttoning his overcoat.
The capable young woman, who had been regarding him with suppressed amusement, wrote out the address on a pad, tore off the leaf, and handed it to him.
" – In case you ever become curious to see little Stephanie Quest, whom you have aided so generously – " she explained.
Cleland, recollecting with increasing annoyance that he had three hundred dollars less to waste on Christensen than he had that morning, muttered the polite formality of leave-taking required of him, and bowed himself out, carrying the slip of paper in his gloved fingers, extended as though he were looking for a place to drop it.
Down in the street, where his car stood, the sidewalks were slowly whitening under leisurely falling snowflakes. The asphalt already was a slippery mess.
"Where's that!" he demanded peevishly, shoving the slip of paper at his chauffeur. "Do you know?"
"I can find it, sir."
"All right," snapped John Cleland.
He stepped into the little limousine and settled back with a grunt. Then he hunched himself up in the corner and perked the fur robe over his knees, muttering. Thoughts of his wife, of his son, had been heavily persistent that morning. Never before had he felt actually old – he was only fifty-odd. Never before had he felt himself so alone, so utterly solitary. Never had he so needed the comradeship of his only son.
He had relapsed into a sort of grim, unhappy lethargy, haunted by memories of his son's baby days, when the car stopped in the tenement-lined street, swarming with push-carts and children.
The damp, rank stench of the unwashed smote him as he stepped out and entered the dirty hallway, set with bells and letter boxes and littered with débris and filthy melting snow.
The place was certainly vile enough. A deformed woman with sore eyes directed him to the floor where the Schmidt family lived. On the landing he stumbled over several infants who were playing affectionately with a dead cat – probably the first substitute for a doll they had ever possessed. A fight in some room on the second floor arrested his attention, and he halted, alert and undecided, when the dim hallway resounded with screams of murder.
But a slatternly young woman who was passing explained very coolly that it was only "thim Cassidys mixing it"; and she went her way down stairs with her cracked pitcher, and he continued upward.
"Schmidt? In there," replied a small boy to his inquiry; and resumed his game of ball against the cracked plaster wall of the passage.
Answering his knock, a shapeless woman opened the door.
"Mrs. Schmidt?"
"Yes, sir," – retying the string which alone kept up her skirt.
He explained briefly who he was, where he had been, what he had done through the United Charities for the child, Stephanie.
"I'd like to take a look at her," he added, "if it's perfectly convenient."
Mrs. Schmidt began to cry:
"Ex-cuse me, sir; I'm so glad we can keep her. Albert has all he can do for our own kids – but the poor little thing! – it seemed hard to send her away to a Home – " She gouged out the tears abruptly with the back of a red, water-soaked hand.
"Steve! Here's a kind gentleman come to see you. Dry your hands, dearie, and come and thank him."
A grey-eyed child appeared – one of those slender little shapes, graceful in every unconscious movement of head and limbs. She was drying her thin red fingers on a bit of rag as she came forward, the steam of the wash-boiler still rising from her bare arms.
A loud, continuous noise arose in the further room, as though it were full of birds and animals fighting.
For a moment the tension of inquiry and embarrassment between the three endured in silence; then an odd, hot flush seemed to envelop the heart of Cleland Senior – and something tense within his brain loosened, flooding his entire being with infinite relief. The man had been starving for a child; that was all. He had suddenly found her. But he didn't realize it even now.
There was a shaky chair in the exceedingly clean but wretchedly furnished room. Cleland Senior went over and seated himself gingerly.
"Well, Steve?" he said with a pleasant, humourous smile. But his voice was not quite steady.
"Thank the good, kind gentleman!" burst out Mrs. Schmidt, beginning to sob again, and to swab the welling tears with the mottled backs of both fists. "You're going to stay with us, dearie. They ain't no policeman coming to take you to no institoot for orphan little girls! The good, kind gentleman has give the money for it. Go down onto your knees and thank him, Steve – !"
"Are you really going to keep me?" faltered the child. "Is it true?"
"Yes, it's true, dearie. Don't go a-kissing me! Go and thank the good, kind – "
"Let me talk to the child alone," interrupted Cleland drily. "And shut the door, please!" – glancing into the farther room where a clothes-boiler steamed, onions were frying, five yelling children swarmed over every inch of furniture, a baby made apocryphal remarks from a home-made cradle, and a canary bird sang shrilly and incessantly.
Mrs. Schmidt retired, sobbing, extolling the goodness and kindness of John Cleland, who endured it with patience until the closed door shut out eulogies, yells, canary and onions.
Then he said:
"Steve, you need not thank me. Just shake hands with me. Will you? I – I like children."
The little girl, whose head was still turned toward the closed door behind which had disappeared the only woman who had ever been consistently kind to her, now looked around at this large, strange man in his fur-lined coat, who sat there smiling at her in such friendly fashion.
And slowly, timidly, over the child's face the faintest of smiles crept in delicate response to his advances. Yet still in the wonderful grey eyes there remained that heart-rending expression of fearful inquiry which haunts the gaze of children who have been cruelly used.
"Is your name Stephanie?"
"Yes, sir."
"Stephanie Quest?"
"Yes, sir."
"What shall I call you? Steve?"
"Yes, sir," winningly grave.
"All right, then. Steve, will you shake hands?"
The child laid her thin, red, water-marred fingers in his gloved hand. He retained them, and drew her nearer.
"You've had a rather tough deal, Steve, haven't you?"
The child was silent, standing with head lowered, her bronzed brown hair hanging and shadowing shoulders and face.
"Do you go to school, Steve?"
"Yes, sir."
"Not to-day?"
"No, sir. It's Saturday."
"Oh, yes. I forgot. What do you learn in school?"
"Things – writing – reading."
"Do you like school?"
"Yes, sir."
"What do you like best?"
"Dancing."
"Do they teach that? What kind of dancing do you learn to do?"
"Fancy dancing – folk-dances. And I like the little plays that teacher gets up for us."
"Do you like any other of your studies?" he asked drily.
"Droring."
"Drawing?"
"Yes, sir," she replied, flushing painfully.
"Oh. So they teach you to draw? Who instructs you?"
"Miss Crowe. She comes every week. We copy picture cards and things."
"So you like to draw, Steve," nodded Cleland absently, thinking of his only son, who liked to write, and who, God willing, would have every chance to develop his bent in life. Then, still thinking of his only son, he looked up into the grey eyes of this little stranger.
As fate would have it, she smiled at him. And, looking at her in silence he felt the child-hunger gnawing in his heart – felt it, and for the first time, vaguely surmised what it really was that had so long ailed him.
But the idea, of course, seemed hopeless, impossible! It was not fair to his only son. Everything that he had was his son's – everything he had to give – care, sympathy, love, worldly possessions. These belonged to his son alone.
"Are you happy here with these kind people, Steve?" he asked hastily.
"Yes, sir."
But though his conscience should have instantly acquitted him, deep in his lonely heart the child-hunger gnawed, unsatisfied. If only there had been other children of his own – younger ones to play with, to have near him in his solitude, to cuddle, to caress, to fuss over as he and his dead wife had fussed over their only baby! —
"Steve?"
"Sir?"
"You are sure you will be quite happy here?"
"Yes, sir."
"Would you – " A pause; and again he looked up into the child's face, and again she smiled.
"Steve, I never had a little girl. It's funny, isn't it?"
"Yes, sir."
A silence.
"Would you like to – to go to a private school?"
The child did not understand. So he told her about such schools and the little girls who went to them. She seemed deeply interested; her grey eyes were clear and seriously intelligent, and very, very intently fixed on him in the effort to follow and understand what he was saying.
He told her about other children who lived amid happy surroundings; what they did, how they were cared for, schooled, brought up; what was expected of them by the world – what was required by the world from those who had had advantages of a home, of training, of friends, and of an education. He was committing himself with every word, and refused to believe it.
At times he paused to question her, and she always nodded seriously that she understood.
"But this," he added smilingly, "you may not entirely comprehend, Steve; that such children, brought up as I have explained to you, owe the human race a debt which is never cancelled." He was talking to himself now, more than to her; voicing his thoughts; feeling his way toward the expression of a philosophy which he had heretofore only vaguely entertained.
"The hope of the world lies in such children, Steve," he said. "The world has a right to expect service from them. You don't understand, do you?"
Her wonderfully clear eyes were almost beautiful with intelligence as they looked straight into his. Perhaps the child understood more than she herself realized, more than he believed she understood.
"Shall I come to see you again, Steve?"
"Yes, sir, please."
There was a pause. Very gently the slight pressure of his arm, which had crept around her, conveyed to her its wistful meaning; and when she understood she leaned slowly toward him in winning response, and offered her lips with a gravity that captivated him.
"Good-bye, Steve, dear," he said unsteadily. "I'll come to see you again very soon. I surely, surely will come back again to see you, Steve."
Then he put on his hat and went out abruptly – not down town to Christensen's, but back to the United Charities, and, after an hour, from there he went down town to his attorney's, where he spent the entire day under suppressed excitement.
For there were many steps to take and much detail to be attended to before this new and momentous deal could be put through – a transaction concerning a human soul and the measures to be taken to insure its salvage.
CHAPTER III
During the next few weeks John William Cleland's instinct fought a continuous series of combats with his reason.
Instinct, with her powerful allies, loneliness and love, urged the solitary man to rash experiment; reason ridiculed impulse and made it very clear to Cleland that he was a fool.
But instinct had this advantage; she was always awake, whispering to his mind and heart; and reason often fell asleep on guard over his brain.
But when awake, reason laughed at the conspirators, always in ambush to slay him; and carried matters with a high hand, rebuking instinct and frowning upon her allies.
And John Cleland hesitated. He wrote to his only son every day. He strove to find occupation for every minute between the morning awakening in his silent chamber and the melancholy lying down at night.
But always the battle between reason and instinct continued.
Reason had always appealed to Cleland Senior. His parents and later his wife and son had known the only sentimental phenomena which had ever characterized him in his career. Outside of these exceptions, reason had always ruled him. This is usually the case among those who inherit money from forebears who, in turn, have been accustomed to inherit and hand down a moderate but unimpaired fortune through sober generations.
Such people are born logical when not born fools. And now Cleland Senior, mortified and irritated by the increasing longing which obsessed him, asked himself frequently which of these he really was.
Every atom of logic in him counselled him to abstain from what every instinct in him was desiring and demanding – a little child to fill the loneliness of his heart and house – something to mitigate the absence of his son, whose absences must, in the natural course of events, become more frequent and of longer duration with the years of college imminent, and the demands of new interests, new friends increasing year by year.
He told himself that to take another child into his home would be unfair to Jim; to take her into his heart was disloyal; that the dear past belonged to his wife alone, the present and the future to his only son.
And all the while the man was starving for what he wanted.
Well, the arrangements took some time to complete; but they were fairly complete when finished. She kept her own name; she was to have six thousand dollars a year for life after she became twenty-one. He charged himself with her mental, moral, spiritual, physical, and general education.
It came about in the following manner:
First of all, he went to see a gentleman whom he had known for many years, but whose status with himself had always remained a trifle indefinite in his mind – somewhere betwixt indifferent friendship and informal acquaintanceship.
The gentleman's name was Chiltern Grismer; his business, charity and religion. He did not dispense either of these, however; he made a living for himself out of both. Cleland had learned at the United Charities that Grismer was an important personage in the Manhattan Charities Concern, a separate sectarian affair with a big office building, and a book bindery in Brooklyn for the immense tonnage of sectarian books and pamphlets published and sold by the "Concern," as it called itself. The profits were said to be enormous.
Grismer, tall, bony, sandy and with a pair of unusually light yellowish eyes behind eye-glasses, appeared the classical philanthropist of the stage. With his white, bushy side-whiskers, his frock coat, and his little ready-made black bow-tie, slightly askew under a high choker, he certainly dressed the part. In fact, any dramatic producer would have welcomed him in the rôle, for he had no "business" to learn; it was perfectly natural for him to join his finger tips together while conversing; and his voice and manner left nothing whatever to criticize.
"Ah! My friend of many years!" he exclaimed as Cleland was ushered into his office in the building of the Manhattan Charities Concern. "And how, I pray, can I be of service to my old friend, John Cleland? M-m-m'yes – my friend of many years!"
Cleland told his story very simply, adding:
"I understand that your Concern is handling Case 119, Grismer – acting, I believe, for a child-placing agency."
"Which case?" demanded Grismer, almost sharply.
"Case 119. The case of Stephanie Quest," repeated Cleland.
Grismer looked at him with odd intentness for a moment, then his eyes shifted, as though something were disturbing his suave mental tranquillity:
"M-m-m'yes. Oh, yes. I believe we have this case to handle among many others. M-m-m! Quite so; quite so. Case 119? Quite so."
"May I have the child?" asked Cleland bluntly.
"Bless me! Do you really wish to take such chances, Cleland?"
"Why not? Others take them, don't they?"
"M-m-m'yes. Oh, yes. Certainly. But it is usually people of the – ah – middle and lower classes who adopt children. M-m-m'yes; the middle and lower classes. And, naturally, they would not be very much disappointed in a foundling or waif who failed to – ah – develop the finer, subtler, more delicate Christian qualities that a gentleman in your position might reasonably expect – m-m-m'yes! – might, as it were, demand in an adopted child."
"I'll take those chances in the case in question," said Cleland, quietly.
"M-m-m'yes, the case in question. Case 119. Quite so… I am wondering – " he passed a large, dry hand over his chin and mouth, reflectively, while his light-coloured eyes remained alertly on duty. "I have been wondering whether you have looked about before deciding on this particular child. There are a great many other deserving cases, m-m-m'yes – a great many deserving cases – "
"I want this particular child, Grismer."
"Quite so. M-m-m'yes." He looked up almost furtively. "You – ah – have some previous knowledge, perhaps, of this little girl's antecedents?"
Mr. Grismer's voice grew soft and persuasive; his finger tips were gently joined. Cleland, looking up at him, caught a glimmer resembling suspicion in those curiously light-coloured eyes.
"Yes, I have learned certain things about her," he said shortly. "I know enough! I want that child for mine and I'm going to have her."
"May I ask – ah – just what facts you have learned about this unfortunate infant?"
Cleland, bored to the verge of irritation, told him what he had learned.
There was a silence during which Grismer came to the conclusion that he had better tell Cleland another fact which necessary legal investigation of the child's antecedents might more bluntly reveal. Yes, certainly Grismer felt that he ought to place himself on record at once and explain this embarrassing fact in his own way before others cruelly misinterpreted it to Cleland. For John Cleland's position in New York among men of wealth, of affairs, of influence, and of culture made this sudden and unfortunate whim of his for Stephanie Quest a matter of awkward importance to Chiltern Grismer, who had not cared to figure in the case at all.
Grismer's large, dry hand continued to massage his jaw. Now and then the bony fingers wandered caressingly toward the white side-whiskers, but always returned to screen the thin lips with a gentle, incessant massage.
"Cleland," he began in a solemn voice, "have you ever heard that this child is – ah – is a very distant connection of my family? – m-m-m'yes – my immediate family. Have you ever heard any ill-natured gossip of this nature?"
Cleland, too astonished to reply, merely gazed at him. And Grismer wrongly concluded that he had heard about it, somewhere or other.
"M-m-m'yes – a connection – very distant, of course. In the event that you have heard of this unfortunate affair from sources perhaps unfriendly to myself and family – m-m-m'yes, unfriendly – possibly it were judicious to explain the matter to you – in justice to myself."
"I never heard of it," said Cleland, " – never dreamed of such a connection."
But to Grismer all men were liars.
"Oh, I did not know. I thought you might have heard malicious rumours. But it is just as well that you should be correctly informed… Do you recollect ever reading anything concerning my – ah – late sister?"
"Do you mean something that happened many, many years ago?"
"That is what I refer to. Did you read of it in the newspapers?"
"Yes," said Cleland. "I read that she ran away with a married man."
"Doubtless," continued Grismer with a sigh, "you recollect the dreadful disgrace she brought upon my family? The cruel scandal exploited by a pitiless and malicious press?"
Cleland said nothing.
"Let me tell you the actual facts," continued Grismer gently. "The unfortunate woman became infatuated with a common Pullman conductor – an Irishman named Conway – a very ordinary man who already was married.
"His religion forbade divorce; my wretched sister ran away with him. We have always striven to bear the disgrace with resignation – m-m-m'yes, with patience and resignation. That is the story."
Cleland, visibly embarrassed, sat twisting the handle of his walking-stick, looking persistently away from Grismer. The latter sighed heavily.
"And so," he murmured, "our door was forever closed to her and hers. She became as one ignobly dead to us – as a soul damned for all eternity."
"Oh, come, Grismer – "
"Damned – hopelessly, and for all eternity," repeated Grismer with a slight snap of his jaw; " – she and her children, and her children's children – "
"What!"
" – The sins of the parents that are borne through generations!"
"Nonsense! That is Old Testament bosh – "
"Pardon!" said Grismer, with a pained forbearance. "It is the creed of those who worship and believe the truth as taught in the church of which I am a member."
"Oh, I beg your pardon."
"Granted," said Grismer sadly.
He sat caressing his jaw in silence for a while, then:
"Her name was Jessie Grismer. She – ah – assumed the name of Conway… God did not bless the unholy union. There was a daughter, Laura. A certain Harry Quest, the profligate, wasted son of that good man, the Reverend Anthony Quest, married this girl, Laura Conway… God, mindful of His wrath, still punished the seed of my sinful sister, even until the second generation… Stephanie Quest is their daughter."
"Good heavens, Grismer! I can't understand that you, knowing this, have not done something – "
"Why? Am I to presume to interfere with God's purpose? Am I to question the righteousness of His wrath?"
"But – she is the little grandchild of your own sister! – "
"A sister utterly cut off from among us! A sister dead to us – a soul eternally lost and to be eternally forgotten."
"Is that your —creed– Grismer?"
"It is."
"Oh. I thought that sort of – I mean, I thought such creeds were out of date – old-fashioned – "
"God," said Chiltern Grismer patiently, "is old-fashioned, I believe – m-m-m'yes – very old fashioned, Cleland. But His purposes are terrible, and His wrath is a living thing to those who have the fear of God within their hearts."
"Oh. Well, I'm sorry, but I really can't be afraid of God. If I were, I'd doubt Him, Grismer… Come; may I have the little girl?"
"Do you desire her to abide under your roof after what you have learned?"
"Why, Grismer, I'd travel all the way to hell to get her now, if any of your creed had managed to send her there. Come; I've seen the child. It may be a risk, as you say. In fact, it can't help being a risk, Grismer. But – I want her. May I have her?"
"M-m-m – " he touched a bell and a clerk appeared. Then he turned to Cleland. "Would you be good enough to see our Mr. Bunce? I thank you. Good afternoon! I am happy to have conversed again with my old friend, John Cleland, – m-m-m'yes, my friend of many years."
An hour later John Cleland left "our" Mr. Bunce, armed with proper authority to begin necessary legal proceedings.
Talking it over with Brinton, his attorney, that evening, he related the amazing conversation between himself and Chiltern Grismer.
Brinton laughed:
"It isn't religious bigotry; it's just stinginess. Grismer is the meanest man on Manhattan Island. Didn't you know it?"
"No. I don't know him well – though I've been acquainted with him for a long while. But I don't see how he can be stingy."
"Why?"
"Well, he's interested in charity – "
"He's paid a thumping big salary! He makes money out of charity. Why shouldn't he be interested?"
"But he publishes religious books – "
"Of course. They sell. It's a great graft, Cleland. Don't publish novels if you want to make money; print Bibles!"
"Is that a fact?"
"You bet! There are more parasites in pulpit, publishing house and charity concerns, who live exclusively by exploiting God, than there were unpleasant afflictions upon the epidermis of our late friend, Job. And Chiltern Grismer is one of them – the old skinflint! – hogging his only sister's share of the Grismer money and scared stiff for fear some descendant might reopen the claim and fight the verdict which beggared his own sister!"
"By Gad!" exclaimed Cleland, very red; "I've a mind to look into it and start proceedings again if there is any ground – "