“Look here!” he said. “You don’t mean—you can’t mean—it was signed with a man’s name, but I felt sure Miss Torrance wrote it, because it’s based on a story I told her myself, about Robertson. I called him ‘Smith,’ but I suppose she knew all the time—”
“No!” Olive interposed. “No! Mr. Martin, I’m awfully sorry, but—I wrote that story!”
“What? You?”
“I’m awfully sorry,” Olive said again, and she looked so. “You see, Mr. Robertson told me the story himself, and he didn’t say that it wasn’t to be used.”
“Naturally he didn’t. It never entered his head that you would—”
“But, you see, I didn’t mean—I didn’t think—I only thought it was funny.”
“Funny!” cried Mr. Martin, all his indignation returning. “You thought it was funny to say—wait a minute!” He pulled a magazine out of his pocket and turned the pages. “This!” he said in a terrible voice. “You say, ‘The man went bowed under the weight of his infidelity. False to his duty, false to his inmost self, he—’”
“I didn’t!”
“Here it is in black and white. ‘Raising his glass in his shaking hand, he drank again, his bleared eyes peering—’”
“I did not!” cried Olive.