At the sight of his brother, Wynne stopped crying, and composed himself to the best of his ability.
“What do you want?” he asked.
Wallace found some difficulty in replying. No one cares to admit they are visiting the Chamber of Horrors for pleasure, although that is the true explanation of their presence. At length he said:
“Shut up—” and added in support of his command, “you silly fool.”
“You needn’t stare at me if I’m a silly fool,” said Wynne.
“A cat may look at a king,” was Wallace’s considered retort.
“Well, I’d rather a cat looked at me than you did,” said Wynne, feeling he had nearly brought off something very telling.
Wallace’s intention had not been to excite an argument on reciprocal lines. He desired to get at his brother’s reasons for the wholesale smash-up downstairs, consequently he allowed the remark to pass unchallenged.
“Why did you break the overmantel and all those vases?” he demanded.
“Because they were beastly and ugly.”