Blayne. Caddy has money—lucky devil. Place at Home, too.
Doone. He comes of first-class stock. 'Can't quite understand his being caught by a Colonel's daughter, and (looking cautiously round room.) Black Infantry at that! No offence to you, Blayne.
Blayne. (Stiffly.) Not much, thaanks.
Curtiss. (Quoting motto of Irregular Moguls.) “We are what we are,” eh, old man? But Gadsby was such a superior animal as a rule. Why didn't he go Home and pick his wife there?
Mackesy. They are all alike when they come to the turn into the straight. About thirty a man begins to get sick of living alone.
Curtiss. And of the eternal mutton—chop in the morning.
Doone. It's a dead goat as a rule, but go on, Mackesy.
Mackesy. If a man's once taken that way nothing will hold him, Do you remember Benoit of your service, Doone? They transferred him to Tharanda when his time came, and he married a platelayer's daughter, or something of that kind. She was the only female about the place.
Doone. Yes, poor brute. That smashed Benoit's chances of promotion altogether. Mrs. Benoit used to ask “Was you goin' to the dance this evenin'?”
Curtiss. Hang it all! Gadsby hasn't married beneath him. There's no tar-brush in the family, I suppose.