“He has to make his way out in Nigeria. He couldn’t think of marrying for years and when he does it must be a woman who can stand the climate, and is in other ways—Why hasn’t he told us? Of course he’s ashamed. He knows he’s been a fool. And so he has—a damned fool.”
She grew furious.
“Whereas Miss Schlegel has lost no time in publishing the news.”
“If I were a man, Mr. Wilcox, for that last remark I’d box your ears. You’re not fit to clean my niece’s boots, to sit in the same room with her, and you dare—you actually dare—I decline to argue with such a person.”
“All I know is, she’s spread the thing and he hasn’t, and my father’s away and I—”
“And all that I know is—”
“Might I finish my sentence, please?”
“No.”
Charles clenched his teeth and sent the motor swerving all over the lane.
She screamed.