Mr.Meyer was beside himself with rage.

He rushed wildly home.

Fortunately, he made such a row when he burst into the house that the other members of the family had time to get Matilda out of his way, so that he had to be content with disinheriting his abandoned daughter on the spot, and forbidding her, under pain of extermination, ever to appear beneath his roof again.

A tiger could not have been more furious, and in the pitilessness of his rage he commanded that her accursed name should never be mentioned in his presence, and threatened to send packing after the minx whoever had the audacity to defend her.
His merciless humour lasted for a whole week.

Very often his tongue itched to ask a question or two, but he stifled the rising words, and still kept silence.