“I am acting for Miss Hayden,” Gerry announced with gravity.
“We’re all acting for Miss Hayden!” mocked Louis, with a foolish upward movement of his hands. But Gunboat ignored that derisive interruption.
“In what way ’re yuh actin’ for her?” he demanded, with his shoulders squared and his chin out.
“As her husband,” said Gerry with a grimness which was quite new to him.
Gunboat swung slowly about and stared at the girl on the other side of the cherrywood table. He saw a slow flush creep up into the shell-pink of her cheeks.
“Are yuh married to this mucker?” he demanded, with a thumb-jerk toward the unobserving Gerald Rhindelander West. And he swallowed hard as he put the question, just as Teddie used to swallow hard when she beheld the castor-oil bottle being lifted down out of the medicine cabinet.
“I am not!” was Teddie’s quiet but distinct-noted reply.
“Are yuh goin’ to be?” queried the narrow-eyed Gunboat.
“I am not going to be,” replied Teddie, with an opaque eye on a slightly crestfallen young attorney.
Gunboat shook his cauliflower ear in a little nod of comprehension. Then he turned back to the girl.