Vicky looked at him helplessly.
Brown-haired, blue-eyed, with a sturdy body and a taste for outdoor exercise, she might have been any young upper-middle-class wife. She was a good wife; she managed Arthur's home efficiently, and had a way with servants. Everything seemed normal except this one black image.
Uncle Hubert cleared his throat.
"I am sure," he pursued, "that if you talk the matter over with Arthur, quietly—"
"Talk it over? I couldn't even go near him with a story like that!"
Uncle Hubert regarded her anxiously.
"Then I hope, my dear, that you are not meditating any such regrettable step as — er — going near the authorities? There is the family honor to consider."
"Family honor!" said Vicky. Her sick rage blinded her. "Family honor! All you're thinking about is your meal-ticket. You've been blackmailing Arthur and you know it."
Uncle Hubert looked genuinely shocked and hurt. His distress was, in fact, so evident that at any other time Vicky would have comforted him.
"Now there, my dear," he pointed out, "you wrong me. You really do wrong me. Candor compels me to admit that I may have mentioned the matter to the boy, and expressed my sympathy for him in his awkward predicament. That is all. No transaction of a sordid financial nature, I give you my word, has ever been so much as mentioned between us."