"You kept her long enough about you!" madam answered, in a tone between vexation and raillery.
"I own it; and I am not proud of it," the new-comer rejoined. Whereat, though I was careful not to look at the woman listening beside me, I saw the veins in one of her hands which was under my eyes swell with the rage in her, and the nail of the thumb grow white with the pressure she was placing on the table to keep herself still. "I am very far from proud of it," the speaker continued, "and for the matter of that----"
"You were always a bit of a Puritan, Charles," my lady cried.
"It may be."
"I am sure I do not know where you get it from," madam continued irritably, stirring in her chair--I heard it crack, and her voice told the rest. "Not from me, I'll swear!"
"I never accused you, madam."
That answer seemed to please her, for on the instant she went off into such a fit of laughter as fairly choked her. When she had a little recovered from the paroxysm of coughing that followed this, "You can be more amusing than you think, Charles," she said. "If your father had had a spark of your humour----"
"I thought that it was agreed between us that we should not talk of him," the man said gravely, and with a slight suspicion of sternness in his voice.
"Oh, if you are on your high horse!" madam answered, "the devil take you! But, there, I am sure that I do not want to talk of him, poor man. He was dull enough. Let us talk of something livelier, let us talk of Monterey instead; what is amiss with her?"
"I do not think that she is a fit person to be about you."