"How dare you eat it there," said Hayes brutally: "take it to your own
crib: come, mizzle." And with that lent him a contemptuous kick behind,
which owing to his position sent him off his balance flat on the tray; a
glass broke under him. Poor young Mr. Beverley uttered a cry of dismay,
for he knew Hayes would not own himself the cause. Hayes cursed him for
an awkward idiot, and the oath went off into a howl, for Alfred ran out
at him brimful of Moses, and with a savage kick in the back and blow on
the neck, administered simultaneously, hurled him head foremost down the
stairs. Alighting on the seventh step, he turned a somersault, and
bounded like a ball on to the landing below, and there lay stupefied. He
picked himself up by slow degrees, and glared round with speechless awe
and amazement up at the human thunderbolt that had shot out on him and
sent him flying like a feather. He shook his fist, and limped silently
away all bruises and curses, to tell Rooke and concert vengeance. Alfred,
trembling still with ire, took Beverley to his room (the boy was as white
as a sheet), and encouraged him, and made him wash properly, brushed his
hair, dressed him in a decent tweed suit he had outgrown, and taking him
under his arm, and walking with his own nose haughtily in the air,
paraded him up and down the asylum, to show them all the best man in the
house respected the poor soft gentleman.
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