“Not a bit,” said Pepper warmly. “No man could ever have a harder or more unfeeling wife than you was. I’ll say that for you, willing.”
As he bore this testimony to his wife’s fidelity there was a knock at the door, and, upon his opening it, the rector’s daughter, a lady of uncertain age, entered, and stood regarding with amazement the frantic but ineffectual struggles of Captain Crippen to release himself from a position as uncomfortable as it was ridiculous.
“Mrs. Pepper!” said the lady, aghast. “Oh, Mrs. Pepper!”
“It’s all right, Miss Winthrop,” said the lady addressed, calmly, as she forced the captain’s flushed face on to her ample shoulder again; “it’s my first husband, Jem Budd.”
“Good gracious!” said Miss Winthrop, starting. “Enoch Arden in the flesh!”
“Who?” inquired Pepper, with a show of polite interest.
“Enoch Arden,” said Miss Winthrop. “One of our great poets wrote a noble poem about a sailor who came home and found that his wife had married again; but, in the poem, the first husband went away without making himself known, and died of a broken heart.”
She looked at Captain Crippen as though he hadn’t quite come up to her expectations.
“And now,” said Pepper, speaking with great cheerfulness, “it’s me that’s got to have the broken heart. Well, well.”
“It’s a most interesting case,” cried Miss Winthrop; “and, if you wait till I fetch my camera, I’ll take your portrait together just as you are.”