She knelt down beside his chair and clasped his hands. “Perry, how do you feel?” she asked earnestly. “Are you sure that it is no more than a chill?”
“Why, what else should it be? What’s in your mind?”
“I hardly know, hardly dare to wonder. Perry, when that man picked a quarrel with you—I am speaking of Farnaby—were you not surprised? Did it seem to you reasonable?”
“What has that to do with it?” he asked, opening his eyes at her. “Ay, I daresay I was a trifle surprised, but if Farnaby was foxed, you know—”
“But was he? You did not say so.”
“Lord, how should I know? I did not think so, but he may have been.”
She continued to clasp his hands, looking anxiously up into his face. “You were fired on the day you came over Finchley Common, a shot you believed might have killed you, had it not been for Hinkson. Twice you have been in danger of your life! And now you are ill, mysteriously so, for you have no chill, Perry, and you know it, but only this dry cough, which is growing worse, and the sore throat!”
He stared, sat up with a jerk, and then burst into a laugh that brought on a fit of coughing. “Lord, Ju, you’ll be the death of me! Do you think I am being poisoned? Why, who in the world should want to put me away? Of all the nonsensical notions!”
“Yes, yes, it is nonsensical, it must be!” she said. “I tell myself so, and yet am unconvinced. Perry, have you not considered that if anything should happen to you the greater part of your fortune would be mine?”
This set him off into another fit of laughing. “What! are you trying to make away with me?” he asked. “Be serious, Perry, I beg of you!”