Doctor Hasmer saved the situation by saying quietly, “I'll ask him.”
It was awkward from the first. The man was angular and unyielding. And Mrs. Hasmer, though she tried, couldn't let him alone. She was determined to learn whether he was married. She led up to the direct question more otariously than she knew. Finally it came. They were speaking of his announced plan to travel extensively in the interior of China.
“It must be quite delightful to wander as you do,” she said. “Of course, if one has ties... you, I take it, are an unmarried man, Mr. Brachey ?”
Betty had to lower her face to hide the color that came. If only Mrs. Hasmer had a little humor! She was a dear kind woman; but this!...
The journalist looked, impassively enough, but directly, at his questioner.
She met his gaze. They were flint on steel, these two natures.
“You are obviously not married,” she repeated.
He looked down at his teacup; thinking. Then, abruptly, he set it down on the deck, got up, muttered something that sounded like, “If you will excuse me...” and strode away.
Betty went early to her cabin that evening.
She had no more than switched on her light when the Chinese steward came with a letter.