“Poor old boy, his punishment is horribly out of proportion to his deserts,” thought the rector, as, in the pause that followed, he caught snatches of the low-toned talk of the women, with Gwen’s name entering largely into it, and saw Mrs. Waring’s face fixed on his own wife with pathetic shy yearning, not veering round to her husband with covert eagerness, as it used to do.
Mr. Fellowes caught himself echoing the other husband’s sigh, and he laughed as the absurdity of the situation struck him.
“This must be stopped,” he thought, “it grows mawkish. I wonder if they have forgotten to feed—more than likely. Ruth, have you asked Mrs. Waring if she has lunched?”
“Indeed I haven’t!” she cried, “I don’t know what I can have been thinking about.”
“Oh, please, Mrs. Fellowes,” stammered the little woman, then her eyes turned towards their magnet.
Mr. Waring was at her side and with her hand in his, with a speed that made Mrs. Fellowes gasp.
“The fact is, Mrs. Fellowes,” he explained heroically, “we were both a little forgetful, we—we—” he paused painfully and gulped. “Ah!——I”—
He repented the word sadly, it was the first time his conscience had forced him to separate the two, and it hurt him. “Yes, I was much absorbed in my work—and my wife, I think she is not very well.”
“I am quite well, dear,” she murmured.
“Ah, dearest, I doubt it. I thought some quinine might be beneficial, Mrs. Fellowes. In fact, that was the primary motive of our call.”