'I did so wish to speak a few words to you, Gertrude,' said Norman; 'but it seems as though, now that this captain has come among us, all our old habits and ways are to be upset.'
'I don't see that you need say that,' said she. 'We may, perhaps, be put out a little—that is, mamma and Linda and I; but I do not see that you need suffer.'
'Suffer—no, not suffer—and yet it is suffering.'
'What is suffering?' said she.
'Why, to be as we were last night—not able to speak to each other.'
'Come, Harry, you should be a little reasonable,' said she, laughing. 'If you did not talk last night whose fault was it?'
'I suppose you will say it was my own. Perhaps it was. But I could not feel comfortable while he was drinking gin-and-water—'
'It was rum,' said Gertrude, rather gravely.
'Well, rum-and-water in your mother's drawing-room, and cursing and swearing before you and Linda, as though he were in the cockpit of a man-of-war.'
'Alaric you saw was able to make himself happy, and I am sure he is not more indifferent to us than you are.'