Mr. Quincunx freed his hand and stroked his beard. His fingers were quivering, and Vennie noticed a certain curious twitching in the muscles of his face.
“I shan’t go to Yeoborough any more,” he cried. “None of you need think it!
“That affair is over and done with. I shan’t stay here, any more, either, to be bullied by the Romers and made a fool of by all these idiots. I shall go away. I shall go—far away—to London—to Liverpool,—to—to Norwich,—like the Man in the Moon!”
This final inspiration brought a flicker of his old goblin-humour to the corners of his mouth.
Lacrima looked at Vennie with an imperceptible lifting of her eyebrows, and then sighed deeply.
The latter clasped the arms of her high-backed chair with firm hands.
“I think it is essential that you should know where you are going, Mr. Quincunx. I mean for the child’s sake. You surely don’t wish to drag her aimlessly about these great cities while you look for work?
“Besides,—you won’t be angry will you, if I speak plainly?—what work, exactly, have you in your mind to do? It isn’t, I’m afraid, always easy—”
Mr. Quincunx interrupted her with an outburst of unexpected fury.
“That’s what I knew you’d say!” he cried in a loud voice. “That’s what she says.” He indicated Lacrima. “But you both say it, only because you don’t want me to have the pleasure of adopting Dolores!