His voice tailed away, but Julia only said, "Well?"
"I pledged by word of honour that it was the true one."
Again Julia said, "Well?"
"What is to be done?" the Captain asked.
She showed no signs of grasping his meaning or at all events of helping him out. He burst out irritably, "What on earth have you sold it for? Nothing would induce you to do so before when I asked you to; now, all at once you have taken a freak and parted with it without any consideration whatever. I never saw anything like women, so utterly irrational!"
"I have not sold it," Julia told him; "only sent it away."
"What for? It is perfectly absurd! I suppose you can get it back? You must get it back."
Julia asked "What for?" in her turn.
The Captain enlightened her. "There is Cross," he said; "I told him that was the daffodil, and it is not. Something must be done; we can't cheat him; we must send him the daffodil, or else refund the five pounds. We should have to do that—and we can't."
"No," Julia agreed grimly; "and we would not if we could."