"Mrs. Hemple." He came forward, holding out his hand, and Luella touched it, lightly and uneasily.
"You seem well," he said.
"I am well, thank you."
"I congratulate you on the way you've taken hold of things."
"But I haven't taken hold of things at all," she said coldly. "I do what I have to——"
"That's just it."
Her impatience mounted rapidly.
"I do what I have to, and nothing more," she continued; "and with no particular good-will."
Suddenly she opened up to him again, as she had the night of the catastrophe—realizing that she was putting herself on a footing of intimacy with him, yet unable to restrain her words.
"The house isn't going," she broke out bitterly. "I had to discharge the servants, and now I've got a woman in by the day. And the baby has a cold, and I've found out that his nurse doesn't know her business, and everything's just as messy and terrible as it can be!"