At this I took to my own room in dire confusion, making no doubt I
would presently be given in charge and left to languish in gaol,
perhaps given six months' hard.
Cousin Egbert came to me in a little while and laughed heartily at my
fear that anything legal would be done. He also made some ill-timed
compliments on the neatness of the blow I had dealt Mr.
Belknap-Jackson, but these I found in wretched taste and was begging
him to desist, when the Mixer entered and began to speak much in the
same strain.
"Don't you ever dare do a thing like that again," she warned me,
"unless I got a ringside seat," to which I remained severely silent,
for I felt my offence should not be made light of.
"Three rousing cheers!" exclaimed Cousin Egbert, whereat the two most
unfeelingly went through a vivid pantomime of cheering.
Our host, I understood, had his dinner in bed that night, and
throughout the evening, as I sat solitary in remorse, came the mocking
strains of another of their American folksongs with the refrain:
"You made me what I am to-day,
I hope you're satisfied!"
I conceived it to be the Mixer and Cousin Egbert who did this and,
considering the plight of our host, I thought it in the worst possible
taste. I had raised my hand against the one American I had met who was
at all times vogue.
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