He flushed indignantly.
“Tight? Certainly not! Do they look tight?”
“Well—just a little!—but of course white always makes one appear stout——”
“Stout! You talk about stoutness? You! Why, I’m a paper-knife compared to you!—a positive paper-knife! I believe you actually grudge my wearing white flannels!”
His wife laughed.
“Indeed, no!” she declared. “It amuses me! I rather like it!”
“I should think you did!” he retorted. “Or, if you don’t, you ought to!”
She surveyed him pensively with round, lacklustre eyes.
“What a long time it is!” she said—“What a long, long time since you were thin!—really quite thin, James! Do you remember? When you proposed to me in father’s dining-room and the parlour-maid came in and lit the gas, just as you were going to——”
“You seem very reminiscent this morning,” interrupted her husband, sharply. “Do white flannels move you to sentiment?”