“What! Lavendar? I'll thank Lavendar to mind his business!” Captain Price forgot Gussie; he spoke “earnestly.” “Dog-gone these people that pry into—Oh, now, Gussie, don't!”
“I've worried so awfully,” said Mrs. Cyrus. “Everybody is talking about you. And Dr. Lavendar is so—so angry about it; and now the daughter has charged on me as though it is my fault!—Of course, she is queer, but—”
“Queer? she's queer as Dick's hatband! Why do you listen to her? Gussie, such an idea never entered my head,—or Mrs. North's either.”
“Oh yes, it has! Her daughter said that she had had to speak to her—”
Captain Price, dumbfounded, forgot his fear and burst out: “You're a pack of fools, the whole caboodle! I swear I—”
“Oh, don't blaspheme!” said Gussie, faintly, and staggered a little, so that all the Captain's terror returned. If she fainted!
“Hi, there, Cyrus! Come aft, will you? Gussie's getting white around the gills—Cyrus!”
Cyrus came, running, and between them they get the swooning Gussie to her room. Afterwards, when Cyrus tiptoed down-stairs, he found the Captain at the cabin door. The old man beckoned mysteriously.
“Cy, my boy, come in here;”—he hunted about in his pocket for the key of the cupboard;—“Cyrus, I'll tell you what happened: that female across the street came in, and told poor Gussie some cock-and-bull story about her mother and me!” The Captain chuckled, and picked up his harmonicon. “It scared the life out of Gussie,” he said; then, with sudden angry gravity,—“These people that poke their noses into other people's business ought to be thrashed. Well, I'm going over to see Mrs. North.” And off he stumped, leaving Cyrus staring after him, open-mouthed.
If Mary North had been at home, she would have met him with all the agonized courage of shyness and a good conscience. But she had fled out of the house, and down along the River Road, to be alone and regain her self-control.