Was the seemingly innocent squire referring to himself, or had this abominable old gentleman the temerity to allude to the wife of the vicar of King's Warren as "an old fool?" Who shall say?
"Do you seriously advise it?" went on her tormentor; "do you think I may dare to hope?"
But the vicar's wife answered him never a word.
He rose to go and shook hands with her in his usual hearty manner. By no outward sign did Mrs. Dodd manifest her indignation, but when the squire had left the room she sank into her chair and burst into tears.
"The serpent!" she ejaculated as she pressed her handkerchief to her streaming eyes.
Not one word did Mrs. Dodd utter for many days to her husband of her momentous conversation with the squire. In a statuesque attitude, she sat, like Marius on the ruins of Carthage, or Patience on a monument smiling at grief.
And then she thought with horror of the confidence she had made to old Mrs. Wurzel and the brewer's daughter, not an hour before. On a tiré le vin, il faut payer la bouteille.
