“My dear,” the agitated man replied, ticking off the points on soft fingers, “my dear, I had gone to the window of Swan and Edgar's, leaving you, as you expressly desired, to pay the man yourself. When I came back to you, what I gathered was that the man was entitled to a further sixpence and that you had no change.”
Mrs. Chater lashed herself with the recollection: “Nothing of the kind!” she burst. “Nothing of the kind! What did the man say to you when you asked what was the matter?”
“I quite forget.”
“You do not forget.”
“My dear, I really and truly do forget.”
“For the hundredth time, then, let me tell you. He said that if you pushed your ugly mug into it he would knock off your blooming head.”
“Did he say mug?” asked Mr. Chater, assuming the air of one who, knowing this at the time, would have committed a singularly ferocious murder.
“Well you know that he did say mug—ugly mug. Was that a thing for a man of spirit to take quietly? Was that a thing for a wife to hear bawled at her husband in the open street with the commissionaire grinning behind his hand? To my dying day I shall never forget my humiliation when you handed him sixpence.”
The unhappy husband murmured: “I do so wish you could, my dear.”
Mrs. Chater shook, handled her troops with the skill of a perfect tactician, and hurled in the attack upon another quarter.