‘Oh yes, fairly so. She was only twenty-nine when she died!’
‘Poor girl!’
‘She was happy in her life—though he did blacken her eye once.’
‘Not really?’
‘Yes, he did. And kicked the housemaid.’
‘Oh, the brute!’
‘But on the whole he was a good husband. He had a few very good points about him.’
‘But how does he allude to his wife?’
‘He has a trick of saying, “my wife, poor wretch!”’
‘Impertinent! Frank, you said to-night that other men think what this odious Mr. Pepys says. Yes, you did! Don’t deny it! Does that mean that you always think of me as “poor wretch”?’