“It was you and the kiddies I was thinking of,” said my husband, in a slightly remote voice. And the mockery of that statement, knowing what I knew, was too much for me.
“I’m sorry you didn’t think of us a little sooner,” I observed. And I had the bitter-sweet reward of seeing a stricken light creep up into Dinky-Dunk’s eyes.
“Why do you say that?” he asked.
But I didn’t answer that question of his. Instead, I asked him another.
“Did you know that Lady Alicia came here and announced that she was in love with you?” I demanded, resolved to let the light in to that tangled mess which was fermenting in the silo of my soul.
“Yes, I know,” he quietly affirmed, as he hung his head. “She told me about it. And it was awful. It should never have happened. It made me ashamed even—even to face you!”
“That was natural,” I agreed, with my heart still steeled against him.
“It makes a fool of a man,” he protested, “a situation like that.”
“Then the right sort of man wouldn’t encourage it,” I reminded him, “wouldn’t even permit it.” And still again I caught that quick movement of impatience from him.
“What’s that sort of thing to a man of my age?” he demanded. “When you get to where I am you don’t find love looming so large on the horizon. What—”