"Yes, then; if you will have it so."

"And made me look a fool! I thought it was too good to be true--only you
stuck to it. You were so d--d sure. You would have it so. Nothing would
turn you."

"William, you must remember I advised you not to go."

"Did I ask your advice? Did I ever stoop to ask for it? I acted on
information which you gave me. Went--and got kicked out."

"Kicked out? William!"

"Practically. I don't mean to say the man actually used his boot. If he
had he couldn't have expressed plainer what he meant. Francis Forcus
never had a civil word to fling at me in all his life. But for your
infernal, silly cackle I'd as soon have gone to the devil as to him. If
I'd only had myself and my own feeling to think about--Bessie or no
Bessie--I'd have hanged myself sooner than have gone to him. But I'd got
more than that."

His voice had fallen from its bullying key to a toneless melancholy. Mrs.
Day, who had been standing hitherto, seated herself in the chair by the
chimney corner, and looked at her husband's blunt profile as he sat
before the fire with a sick feeling of impending disaster, and a dismayed
inquiry in her dark eyes.

"I'd got you and the children to think about," the man added.