"You tell him!" she snapped sharply.
Wilkes shivered as under a sudden cold what's-its-name. He looked at her protestingly, his eye cutting a suggestive hint of my presence.
"Oh, go on!"—the judge nodded to him with some impatience. "It's all right—Mr. Lightnut is like one of us. Out with it, whatever it is!"
"Yes, sir." Wilkes coughed acquiescence, but shot a glance, half-reproachful, half-apprehensive, at the housekeeper.
She straightened, bristlingly.
"Are you going to tell him or not—and you a man?—or will you put it on me?" And she began to inflate again.
The poor devil took the plunge:
"The fact is, sir, Mr. Jack—h'm!"—he fidgeted through an instant's misery, then let it come: "It's about him and one of the maids, sir!"
"Wh-a-a-t?"
In the jaw-twisting roar, the judge all but lost his plate—his hand came up just in time to save it. As for Wilkes, his portly figure seemed to lift, balloon-like, from the floor for an instant, then settled back.