Mrs. Darrow felt that something within her must give if this kind of thing went on.
"I don't know how you can speak like that," she said. "I don't know I have a liver."
"Of course you don't—if you did you'd be more careful of it. But here, you——" She placed both of her sinewy hands upon her enormous green umbrella, and brought it down with a thud in front of Gerald. "It's you I really came to see. I heard that you were here. Nothing escapes me in this village. Where is your wife?"
"She appears to have escaped you, Mrs. Parsley—she is in town!"
"Then she oughtn't to be. Why haven't you brought her down here to share your good fortune? She should be at the Manor House beside you."
"I am shutting up the Manor House. I'm going abroad in a week."
"Is that her doing or yours?"
"Mine. Perhaps I had better tell you at once that my wife and I have agreed to differ. We are not living together for the present."
"That means you've been doing something—what is it?"
"I assure you he has been doing nothing," put in Mrs. Darrow, "except what is right. He has been very badly treated. Don't you know that——"