His voice
--Francis had followed him at once into the street--shook with
passion. His hand had fallen heavily upon the shoulder of a huge
carter, who, with whip in hand, was belabouring a thin scarecrow
of a horse.
"What the devil are you doing?" Sir Timothy demanded.
The man stared at his questioner, and the instinctive antagonism
of race vibrated in his truculent reply. The carter was a
beery-faced, untidy-looking brute, but powerfully built and with
huge shoulders. Sir Timothy, straight as a dart, without overcoat
or any covering to his thin evening clothes, looked like a stripling
in front of him.
"I'm whippin' 'er, if yer want to know," was the carter's reply.
"I've got to get up the 'ill, 'aven't I? Garn and mind yer own
business!"
"This is my business," Sir Timothy declared, laying his hand upon
the neck of the horse. "I am an official of the Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. You are laying yourself open
to a fine for your treatment of this poor brute."
"I'll lay myself open for a fine for the treatment of something
else, if you don't quid 'old of my 'oss," the carter retorted,
throwing his whip back into the waggon and coming a step nearer.
"D'yer 'ear? I don't want any swells interferin' with my
business. You 'op it. Is that strite enough? 'Op it, quick!"
Sir Timothy's anger seemed to have abated.
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