"Look here, now—this is no hen party!" he rasped.
"I'm not so sure," she retorted, stirred more and more by jealous suspicions. "It may be a speckled hen party!"
Clarence gave an involuntary start. Then, falling into a quivering rage, he clawed the ground with fury. "Just for that, now, it shall be a speckled hen party! Good-bye!"
"Wait a moment, Clarence!" she called abjectly, as he stalked away. "Ah, don't leave me!"
"Green-eyed termagant!" he gargled, as a parting thrust, and headed straight for the clump of bushes where waited his affinity.
Two days later, when Eustace was expressing to Gertrude his gratification over having converted Martha to modernism, he was suddenly struck dumb by the appearance of the hen herself. That disconsolate female, with every feather ruffled the wrong way, had a shaky manner and a wild look in her eye that gave promise of an unpleasant scene.
"Why, what is the matter?" he inquired nervously, as she drew near and fixed her glance upon him.
"A pretty question for you to ask, you breaker-up of homes!" Eustace took a step backward.
"Monster!—to poison my mind against my husband! I hope you're satisfied, now that you've wrecked my happiness!"
At this point, Gertrude, who had witnessed Martha's first outburst with scornful composure, thought it time to intervene. "Come, come—control yourself!" she said sternly. "Now tell me what's the matter. Have you had a quarrel with Clarence?"