His color was gone, his eyes flashing, his jaw tight set.

About his mouth there hovered a savage, almost brutal look, the look of a bulldog who bares his teeth before he tears and strangles--a look his men knew when someone of them purposely disobeyed his orders.

For a moment he stood as if dazed.

All he remembered clearly was the white, drawn face of a woman gazing at him with staring, tear-drenched eyes, the slow dropping of words that blistered as they fell, and the figure of the nurse wringing her hands and moaning: "Oh, I told ye so! I told ye so! Why didn't ye listen ?" With it came the pain of some sudden blow that deadened his brain and stilled his heart.
With a strong effort, like one throwing off a stupor, he raised his head, braced his shoulders, and strode firmly along the corridor and down the stairs on his way to the front door.

Catching up his coat, he threw it about him, pulled his hat on, with a jerk, slamming the front door, plunged along through the dry leaves that covered the path, and so on out to the main road.