I was standing by the fire at that moment, and I held on to the mantelpiece as my husband came into the room.
SEVENTY-SIXTH CHAPTER
He was very pale. The look of hardness, almost of brutality, which pierced his manner at normal moments had deepened, and I could see at a glance that he was nervous. His monocle dropped of itself from his slow grey eyes, and the white fat fingers which replaced it trembled.
Without shaking hands or offering any other sort of salutation he plunged immediately into the matter that was uppermost in his mind.
"I am still at a loss to account for this affair of your father's," he said. "Of course I know what it is supposed to be—a reception in honour of our home-coming. That explanation may or may not be sufficient for these stupid islanders, but it's rather too thin for me. Can you tell me what your father means by it?"
I knew he knew what my father meant, so I said, trembling like a sheep that walks up to a barking dog:
"Hadn't you better ask that question of my father himself?"
"Perhaps I should if he were here, but he isn't, so I ask you. Your father is a strange man. There's no knowing what crude things he will not do to gratify his primitive instincts. But he does not spend five or ten thousand pounds for nothing. He isn't a fool exactly."
"Thank you," I said. I could not help it. It was forced out of me.