"No! I detest them, though I was not aware of the fact till to-day," he replied.
"They are not cooked to your liking, I fear! I wish, Dexie, you had looked after them a little better. How do you prefer your shad cooked, Mr. Plaisted?" she added, in a concerned voice.
"I do not care for shad in any shape or form," he said, rather shortly, which caused everyone to look up in dismay, all except Dexie, and she seemed intent on finding the minutest bone.
"I am very sorry! You should have spoken about it sooner. Eliza, remove Mr. Plaisted's plate. I hope we have something else you can relish."
He made a show at eating what was set before him, but it was hard work. Could his entertainers talk of nothing else but shad? It appeared not, for when the conversation seemed about to turn to other things a skilfully put question, or a bit of information, brought the fish back to be discussed in another light; consequently, the shad question was pretty well sifted. The method of catching them, the amount caught during the last season, the catch of the previous year compared with other years; in fact, Dexie seemed to have the fishing reports at her finger-ends, or at the end of her tongue, to speak literally, and Mr. Sherwood seemed delighted with the chance to air the knowledge he possessed to such an attentive listener. But Mr. Plaisted's thoughts were elsewhere; he was repeating to himself the lines he had no power to forget, and when dinner was over he was almost a mental wreck.
Dexie was exulting in his misery, and was longing to let him know she was the author of it.
When they entered the parlor, Mr. Sherwood turned to Dexie, saying: "Give us some music, Dexie; something to cheer us up and drive away the blues," and he nodded at Plaisted, who had thrown himself into a chair.
But seated at the piano, Dexie still kept up the torture of the dinner table by selecting songs that suggested fishing, or fishermen's daughters, until Plaisted rose and walked the floor in ill-concealed distress.
Feeling the crisis near at hand, she tried to think of something that would "cap the climax," but as nothing occurred to her, she added a verse impromptu to what she was singing:
"Oh! father dear, I've caught a fish; I'm sure it is a shad;
Pray help me take him off the hook; you see he's hurt so bad!"