"Well," she repeated, "one never knows."
"Because if you do, I'll tell you something."
"What?" Vera demanded.
At this juncture Stephen committed an error of tactics. He might have let her continue in the fear of his death, and thus remained on velvet (subject to occasional outbreaks) for the rest of his life. But he gave himself utterly away.
"She told me I should live till I was ninety," said he. "So you can't be a widow for quite half a century, and you'll be eighty yourself then."
IV
Within twenty-four hours she was at him about the balcony.
"The summer will be lovely," she said, in reply to his argument about climate.
"Rubbish," she said, in reply to his argument about safety.