MRS. JUNO. No: please don't explain. I don't want to know. I take your word for it. Besides, it doesn't matter now. Our voyage is over; and to-morrow I start for the north to my poor father's place.
GREGORY [surprised]. Your poor father! I thought he was alive.
MRS. JUNO. So he is. What made you think he wasn't?
GREGORY. You said your POOR father.
MRS. JUNO. Oh, that's a trick of mine. Rather a silly trick, I Suppose; but there's something pathetic to me about men: I find myself calling them poor So-and-So when there's nothing whatever the matter with them.
GREGORY [who has listened in growing alarm]. But—I—is?— wa—? Oh, Lord!
MRS. JUNO. What's the matter?
GREGORY. Nothing.
MRS. JUNO. Nothing! [Rising anxiously]. Nonsense: you're ill.
GREGORY. No. It was something about your late husband—