“I—that is, I was going to say, by the way, I wonder if you happen to know of a good chauffeur, Mr. Dodge.”
At this, Mrs. Dodge’s breathing became audible as well as visible, there fell a moment of such silence.
“A—a chauffeur? No,” Mr. Dodge said. “No, I don’t think I do. We haven’t one ourselves; we do our own driving. A chauffeur? No. I’m afraid I don’t know of any.”
“I see,” Braithwaite returned. “I just happened to ask. We’ve—ah—lost the man we’ve had lately. He was a very good driver and we haven’t anybody to take his place.”
Mrs. Dodge spoke sepulchrally as she rose from her chair. “That’s too bad,” she said, and, to her husband’s relief, stopped there, adding nothing.
“Yes,” Braithwaite assented. “He was a very good driver indeed; but he was a college graduate and only yesterday he found another position, tutoring, and left us. He was a very good man—Dolling.”
“What?” Mr. Dodge said. “Who?”
“Dolling,” Braithwaite replied; and followed his wife to the door. “I just happened to mention his name: Dolling. I—I didn’t address you as ‘darling,’ Mr. Dodge, though I see how you might easily have thought I did. The man’s name was Dolling. I shouldn’t like you to think I’d take the liberty of calling you——”
But here he was interrupted by such an uproarious shout of laughter from his host that his final words were lost. Mr. Dodge’s laughter continued, though it was interspersed with hearty expressions of hospitality and parting cheer, until the callers had passed the outer threshold and the door had closed behind them. Then the hilarious gentleman returned from the hall to face a wife who found nothing in the world, just then, a laughing matter.
“The worst thing you did,” she assured him, “was to be so fascinated that you told her I’d been amiable to you about your sending that check—just after I said I knew all about it before you sent it and had told you to send it! That was a pleasant position to put your wife in, wasn’t it?”