'You paid going, and I'll pay coming back. You gave the cabman eighteenpence--because I saw you. There's the money. I'll be beholden to no man except my husband.'
I put a shilling and a sixpence on the table. He looked at the coins, and then he looked at me. Then he took them up.
'Oh, all right. I'm willing. Money's always welcome. It doesn't look as if I was going to make much out of your husband, so I don't see why I should lose on you. Besides, I can buy something with it for those two little kids of yours. I don't suppose you can prevent my doing that. Now, Mrs. Merrett, let's understand each other, you and I. What did Mr. John Smith say when you put that question?'
'Nothing.'
'Nothing! You don't mean that! You don't mean that you didn't get an answer out of him after all! Then hang me if I don't go right straight back.'
'I mean that he knows nothing. At least that's what he says.'
'And do you believe him?'
Then I was just the silly I expected. I sat down at the table and cried as if I'd nothing else to do. Presently I felt a hand upon my shoulder. It was Mr. FitzHoward.
'Now then, none of that! Do you hear? Stop it! It's only my nonsense. I exaggerate; it's a professional habit I've got into. It's a kind of second nature; so that people who don't know me think that I mean more than I really do. I believe your husband's as sound and well at this moment as I am.'
'I don't know what to believe.'