“Oh, it’s dreadful!” she sighed, rocking and smelling, and with the tears oozing from her eyes.
“Fiddle! I won’t hear of it. ‘Tain’t dreadful. It’s nothing at all. You must go out with me and make calls this very morning. It’s none of your business. If your husband chooses to fail, let him fail. He can’t expect you to take to making shirts, and to give up society. I shall call at twelve in the carriage; and, mind, don’t you look red and mopy. Remember. So, good-morning! And, May, I want to speak to you.”
They left Mrs. Newt rocking and weeping, with the smelling-bottle at her nose, and descended to the solemn parlor.
“What brought this about?” asked Mrs. Dagon, as she closed the door. “Your mother is in such a state that it does no good to talk to her. Where’s Abel?”
“Aunt Dagon, I have my own opinion, but I know nothing. I suppose Abel is down town.”
“What’s your opinion?”
May paused for a moment, and then said:
“From what I have heard drop from father during the last few years since Abel has been in the business, I don’t believe that Abel has helped him—”
“Exactly,” interrupted Mrs. Dagon, as if soliloquizing; “and why on earth didn’t the fellow marry Hope Wayne, or that Southern girl, Grace Plumer?”
“Abel marry Hope Wayne?” asked May, with an air and tone of such utter amazement and incredulity that Aunt Dagon immediately recovered from her abstraction, and half smiled.