“Listen, Louise,” went on Lester, drawing himself up further on one elbow. “You know as much about life as I do. There is no need of our getting into an argument. I didn’t know you were coming, or I would have made other arrangements.”
“Other arrangements, indeed,” she sneered. “I should think as much. The idea!”
She was greatly irritated to think that she had fallen into this trap; it was really disgraceful of Lester.
“I wouldn’t be so haughty about it,” he declared, his color rising. “I’m not apologizing to you for my conduct. I’m saying I would have made other arrangements, which is a very different thing from begging your pardon. If you don’t want to be civil, you needn’t.”
“Why, Lester Kane!” she exclaimed, her cheeks flaming. “I thought better of you, honestly I did. I should think you would be ashamed of yourself living here in open—” she paused without using the word—“and our friends scattered all over the city. It’s terrible! I thought you had more sense of decency and consideration.”
“Decency nothing,” he flared. “I tell you I’m not apologizing to you. If you don’t like this you know what you can do.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed. “This from my own brother! And for the sake of that creature! Whose child is that?” she demanded, savagely and yet curiously.
“Never mind, it’s not mine. If it were it wouldn’t make any difference. I wish you wouldn’t busy yourself about my affairs.”
Jennie, who had been moving about the dining-room beyond the sitting-room, heard the cutting references to herself. She winced with pain.
“Don’t flatter yourself. I won’t any more,” retorted Louise. “I should think, though, that you, of all men, would be above anything like this—and that with a woman so obviously beneath you. Why, I thought she was—” she was again going to add “your housekeeper,” but she was interrupted by Lester, who was angry to the point of brutality.