"Why?" asked Gammon bluntly.
"Because I had. I'll say good night."
She stood still looking him in the face with cold displeasure; only for a moment though, as her eyes could not bear the honest look in his.
"Right you are," said Gammon with affected carelessness. "Just as you like. I won't force my company on anyone."
Mrs. Clover made the movement which in women of her breeding signifies a formal bow—hopelessly awkward, rigid, and self-conscious—and walked rapidly away. The man, not a little crestfallen, swung round on his heel.
"What's wrong now?" he asked himself. "It can t be about Minnie, for she was all right till after supper. And why it should make her angry because I lugged that cat Polly downstairs is more than I can understand. Well, I shan't die of it."
On re-entering the house he found all quiet. Polly had returned to her chamber, Mrs. Bubb was in the Cheesemans' room. He went down into the kitchen, where the gas was burning, and sat till the landlady came down.
"I don't see as you did much good," was Mrs. Bubb's first remark, in the tone which signifies reaction after excitement. "It weren't worth breaking a door in, it seems to me."
Gammon hung his head.
"Didn't Polly tell her anything?"