"I went too fast for him." He spoke quite sharply, and before he
had time to say he was sorry and didn't mean exactly that, the
window had shut.

"They've quarrelled," she thought. "Whatever about?"

She soon heard. Gerald returned in a cold stormy temper. Rickie
had offered him money.

"My dear fellow don't be so cross. The child's mad."

"If it was, I'd forgive that. But I can't stand unhealthiness."

"Now, Gerald, that's where I hate you. You don't know what it is
to pity the weak."

"Woman's job. So you wish I'd taken a hundred pounds a year from
him. Did you ever hear such blasted cheek? Marry us--he, you, and
me--a hundred pounds down and as much annual--he, of course, to
pry into all we did, and we to kowtow and eat dirt-pie to him. If
that's Mr. Rickety Elliot's idea of a soldier and an Englishman,
it isn't mine, and I wish I'd had a horse-whip."

She was roaring with laughter. "You're babies, a pair of you, and
you're the worst. Why couldn't you let the little silly down
gently? There he was puffing and sniffing under my window, and I
thought he'd insulted you. Why didn't you accept?"

"Accept?" he thundered.