Then, as if he struggled to apprehend the position, “You—you have assaulted me.”
“Let it be—let it be a warning to you,” said Aunt Phœbe.
“That is a threat.”
“Agreed,” panted Aunt Phœbe with spirit, though she had not meant to threaten him at all.
“If you think, madam, that you can assault me with impunity——”
“I shouldn’t have thought it—before I took hold of you. A bag of bones.... Man indeed!” And then very earnestly—“Yes.”
She paused. The pause held all three of them still.
“But why—oh, why!—should I bandy words with such a thing as you?” she asked with a sudden belated recovery of her dignity. “You—”
She sought her word carefully.
“Flibber-gib!”