“Get out of the way at once! I’m going to blow up this building.”
She forgot her obedience and shamed him before strangers by retorting:
“I’ll not budge! I’ve a better right than you in my father’s warehouse.”
“Your father’s? Good God!”
He looked past her and saw old Jessamine’s face, purple with rage and the long use of Madeira and the habit of domination. He was ordering the marine officer off his premises, and the marine officer turned to one of the city officials who was with him. The official nodded and the officer beckoned one of his soldiers and, pointing to Mr. Jessamine, spoke:
“Throw that dunderhead out of here before I tumble the building on him.”
And in a holiday spirit the soldiers ran the old gentleman to the curb.
He almost expired at the sacrilege to his person. Patty whirled, seized her husband as with claws, and screamed:
“Stop them! stop them!”
The first was a bloodcurdling shriek that knifed the air. The second was the cry of a rabbit dragged from its warren by a terrier. Her anger made her faint. Her hands relaxed their clutch, her taut body grew limp and slid down through RoBards’ arms. She was a heap of cloth under a hat at his feet.