"Lilias, you know you can talk to me about anything. What is troubling you? You're very quiet this morning." Archie was worried.
"Archie," she began, with her doe eyes staring into his, "your brother is beginning to terrify me. First, the way he behaves towards you and his prescriptions for you. It's as if he doesn't want to lessen your pain in your therapies and treatments. And, his drinking...Last night...He claimed he was searching for Rose's room- to provide a remedy for her stomach pain, though he came to my room quite inebriated. He frightened me, and that's why I dropped my pearls.
"Did he hurt you?...Touch you?" Archie's quiet and yet serious and deep voice was in contrast to his expression-an irate grimace. Archie knew the drinking was becoming a nasty and dangerous habit of Neville's.
"No," Lilias assured her husband in a meek tone. "But, he let himself in to my room. I was returning from the bath, and he frightened me standing in the entry way past the top of my staircase and beyond the tapestry."
Archie was now livid and mumbled. "My God, I shall make him pay for trespassing upon your privacy. Brazen bastard. Drunk swine. I have no words. He has gravely offended you and now me. If he ever...comes near you in such a state or terrifies you again, I shall ask him to leave Misselthwaite." Archie held his wife tenderly to comfort her.
"What is more," Lilias continued, "I think he and Rose are...engaging in...have become very intimate...In any case, I believe she has broken her marriage vows and has not stayed true to Albert."
"I shall speak to Neville. This is completely unacceptable. I can't have that in my house...our house."
...
"NEVILLE!" Archie bellowed.
"Good God, Archibald. What are you on about?" Neville was lying across the sofa in his study with a pack of ice to his head. Clearly, the ramifications of too much alcohol in his system were now present and in effect.
"Do you dare intrude into my wife's bedroom quarters and violate her privacy at a late night hour?"
"Archie, I have a wretched headache. I don't remember anything of the sort."
"Sober yourself, or be gone from my house! Do you understand?" The anger seemed to slither through Archie's teeth, he was so full of wrath. Metaphorically, his fangs were exposed.
"Brother, on occasion I admit, I find solace in the drink, but only when I've had quite a harrowing day. You cannot know the stress of my profession."
"And Rose...What of Rose? Have you forgotten she is a married woman?" Archie spoke again.
"You should tell her that." Neville shot back.
Archie smacked Neville across the side of his face with his walking stick.
Neville answered with a blank expression holding his hand over the side of his face and mouth which bled quickly in the aftershock.
"Don't be a prig, Archie. I've never been a prude, you know. After all I've done for you, brother, I trust you'll leave my intimate matters be of my own concern. Keep your accusations and allegations to yourself. It is none of your business."
"Consider this a warning!"
Archie turned away sharply refusing to listen to any further excuses.