I sat, very small, on a chair in a corner. I felt like Jezebel,
or whatever her name was, and now the Harbison man was coming,
and he was going to see me stripped of my pretensions to
domesticity and of a husband who neglected me. He was going to
see me branded a living lie, and he would hate me because I had
put him in a ridiculous position. He was just the sort to resent
being ridiculous.

Jim brought him down in a dressing gown and a state of
bewilderment. It was plain that the memory of the afternoon still
rankled, for he was very short with Jim and inclined to resent
the whole thing. The clock in the hall chimed half after three as
they came down the stairs, and I heard Mr. Harbison stumble over
something in the darkness and say that if it was a joke, he
wasn't in the humor for it. To which Jim retorted that it wasn't
anything resembling a joke, and for heaven's sake not to walk on
his feet; he couldn't get around the furniture any faster.

At the door of the den Mr. Harbison stopped, blinking in the
light. Then, when he saw us, he tried to back himself and his
dishabille out into the obscurity of the library. But Aunt Selina
was too quick for him.

"Come in," she called, "I want you, young man. It seems that
there are only two fools in the house, and you are one."

He straightened at that and looked bewildered, but he tried to
smile.