Pats leaned back, and frowned. A torturing thought possessed him. In an anxious tone he said: “I hope I did not talk much when I had the fever.”
As she made no reply he studied the back of her head for some responsive motion. But none came.
“Did I?” he demanded.
“Yes.”
A look of terror came into his face and his voice grew fainter as he asked: “Did I talk about you?”
“Freely.”
With trembling fingers he felt for his handkerchief and drew it across his brow. “Did I say things that–that–I should be ashamed of?”
She nodded.
Pats sunk lower in his chair and closed his 129eyes. Judging from the lines in his cadaverous face the last three minutes had added years to his age.
“Would you mind telling me,” he asked in a deferential voice, so low that it barely reached her, “whether they were impertinent and ungentlemanly–or–or–what?”