To his great discomfort the storm showed signs of coming up again, and he had barely time to effect an appearance of easy unconcern, which accorded but ill with the flush afore-mentioned, when a big, red-faced woman came heavily downstairs and burst into the room.
“You have made me ill again,” she said severely, “and now I hope you are satisfied with your work. You’ll kill me before you have done with me!”
The ex-pilot shifted on his chair.
“You’re not fit to have a wife,” continued Mrs. Pepper, “aggravating them and upsetting them! Any other woman would have left you long ago!”
“We’ve only been married three months,” Pepper reminded her.
“Don’t talk to me!” said his wife; “it seems more like a lifetime!”
“It seems a long time to me,” said the ex-pilot, plucking up a little courage.
“That’s right!” said his wife, striding over to where he sat. “Say you’re tired of me; say you wish you hadn’t married me! You coward! Ah! if my poor first husband was only alive and sitting in that chair now instead of you, how happy I would be!”
“If he likes to come and take it he’s welcome!” said Pepper; “it’s my chair, and it was my father’s before me, but there’s no man living I would sooner give it to than your first. Ah! he knew what he was about when the Dolphin went down, he did. I don’t blame him, though.”
“What do you mean?” demanded his wife.