For a second Ham Adams lapses back into his old glum look.
"That is the only thing that worries me," says he. "No, he isn't married, as yet; but he means to be. And the lady—well, she's a widow, rather well off. Nice sort of person, in a way. A Mrs. Grenville Hawks."
"Not the one that used to send you bunches of roses?" says I.
He stares at me, and then nods.
"It seems that Mr. Nivens had already picked her out—before," says he. "Oh, there was really nothing between us. I'd never been a marrying man, you know. But Mrs. Hawks—well, we were rather congenial. She's bright, not much of a highbrow, and not quite in the swim. I suppose I might have— Oh, widows, you know. Told me she didn't intend to stay one. And now Mr. Nivens has come to know her, in some way; through his cousin Mabel, I suppose. Knows her quite well. She telephones him here. I—I don't like it. It's not playing square with her for him to— Well, you see what I mean. She doesn't know who he was."
"Uh-huh," says I.
"But I'm not sure just what I ought to do," says he.
"If you're callin' on me for a hunch," says I, "say so."
"Why, yes," says he. "What is it?"
"What's the matter," says I, "with beating him to it?"