Come, now, let's talk over the situation sensibly."
Just then they passed beyond the hearing of the astonished eavesdropper.
Good heaven, what was this? Not his child? Two minutes later Mrs.
Odell-Carney was back at the spring where they had left her somnolent
husband, who had refused to climb a hill because all of his breath was
required to smoke a cigaret.
"Carney," she said sternly, her lips rigid, her eyes set hard upon his
face, "how long have the Medcrofts been married?"
He blinked heavily. "How the devil should I know? 'Pon me word, it's--"
"Four years, I think Mrs. Rodney told me. How old is that baby?"
"'Pon me soul, Agatha, I'm as much in the dark as you. I don't know."
"A little over a year, I'd say. Well, I just heard Medcroft say that she
wasn't his child. Whose is it?" She stood there like an accusing angel.
He started violently, and his jaw dropped; an expression of alarmed
protest leaped into his listless eyes.
"'Pon me word, Agatha, how the devil should I know? Don't look at me
like that. Give you my word of honour, I don't know the woman. 'Pon me
soul, I don't, my dear."
He was very much in earnest, thoroughly aroused by what seemed to be a
direct insinuation.
"Oh, don't be stupid," she cried. "Good heavens, can there be a scandal
in that lovely woman's life?"
"There's never any scandal in a woman's life unless she's reasonably
lovely," remarked he.
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