"The amount of attachment you feel, darling, is uncommon."
"Is it? Well, I have got a very uncommon father."
"My dear Valentine, God knows you have."
Gerald sank down into a chair by the fire. He turned his face, dreary, white and worn, to the blaze. Valentine detected no hidden sarcasm in his tones. After a time she took the cheque out of her purse and handed it to him.
"Here, Gerry, you will put this into your bank to-morrow, won't you? We will open an account in our joint names, won't we? And then we can calculate how much we are to spend weekly and monthly. Oh, won't it be interesting and exciting. So much for my clothes, so much for yours, so much for servants, so much for food—we need not spend so much on food, need we? So much for pleasures—I want to go to the theatre at least twice a week—oh, we can manage it all and have something to spare. And no debts, remember, Gerry—ready money will be our system. We'll go in omnibuses, too, to save cabs—I shall love to feel that I am doing for a penny what might cost a shilling. Gerald darling, do you know that just in one way you have vexed my father a little?"
"Vexed him—how, Valentine?"
"He says it is very wrong of you to croak, and have gloomy prognostications. You know you said it was not worth while for me to learn to housekeep. Just as if you were going to die, or I were going to die. Father was quite vexed when I told him. Now you look vexed, Gerry. Really between such a husband and such a father, a poor girl may sometimes feel puzzled. Well, have you nothing to say?"
"I'm afraid I have nothing to say, Valentine."
"Then you won't croak any more."
"Not for you—I have never croaked for you."