His voice rose so swiftly to so fierce a pitch that the woman started violently, and the infant wailed again. Instantly the room shook, and with one stride, paid for by a spasm of pain, the husband towered above the wife; and this time it was a heavy hand upon her shrunk and shrinking shoulder that put a stop to the walk.
"Do you know who it is?" he cried. "My God, I believe you do!"
"I don't, indeed!"
"She never told you?"
"God knows she did not."
"Or anybody else?"
"I don't know."
"But you think—you think! I see it in your face. Who is it you think she may have told? I'll soon find out from him or her; trust me to wring that out!"
For answer, the woman subsided in sobs upon the horsehair sofa, rocking herself and the baby in her grief and terror. "You'll be that angry with me," she moaned; "you'll be right mad!"
"Oh, no, I sha'n't," said Musk, in a kindlier voice. "I'm not so bad as all that, though this do fare to make a man crazy. Tell away, old woman, and don't you be afraid."