Rich was taken aback.
"My dear sir," he began, with the color rising in his face, "I never thought… that is, it seemed so obvious!.. Mr. Hubert Fane assured me…"
"Oh, we're only supposing!" Arthur reassured him. He was really smiling now. The thick complacency of his tone would have been felt anywhere, even at his club. "I'm not one to talk about my marriage, as you'll agree. But I don't mind saying that to find a happier couple than Victoria and I you'd have to go far. Very far indeed."
He paused.
"Some people," he added, "might call my life humdrum—"
"Dear boy," interposed Uncle Hubert, with his eye on a corner of the lamp-shade, "I feel sure they would do you no such injustice, if they knew you as I do."
"But I don't call it humdrum," concluded Arthur, after giving him a brief look. "Carry on with the experiment."
Frank Sharpless took a few steps up and down the bare hardwood floor, with its few bright rugs. His black mess jacket with scarlet lapels, and close-fitting black trousers with scarlet stripe down the side, gave him a lean and Mephistophelian appearance which was contradicted by the naive youthfulness of the face. His booted footsteps rattled on the floor. Though he made a gesture of protest, he did not speak again.
"Then we are all agreed?" inquired Rich. "Good!"
He put the lid on the cardboard box containing the revolver and the rubber dagger. This box he handed to Arthur.