"Joe, you ain't serious? You ain't turning our child out of our house at midnight?"
We must admit that Quinney was not serious, but for the moment he was in no condition to think soberly. He replied fiercely:
"I'm turning out a—adder!"
Susan faced him. He had lost his head; she lost hers.
"If you do this——" she gasped.
"Go on!"
"If you do this unnatural, cruel, wicked——"
"That's right. Hit a man when he's down!"
"Down!" she retorted, as fiercely as he; "it's up you are, Joe Quinney, tens o' thousands o' feet above all common sense and common decency. It is things you care for—things—things—things! And our Posy—my Posy, bless her!—is right to prefer persons to the graven images, the false gods, which you've set up and worshipped—yes, worshipped! There's only one person in all the world you care for, and that's yourself—yourself!"
She flung herself into a chair in a paroxysm of grief and distress, covering her face with the hands which had worked so faithfully for a husband changed beyond recognition. Posy flew to her.