Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 6).djvu/59

"He listens at the keyhole."

Fanny: I beg pardon, that clock is at least an hour too slow.

Dick (looks at his watch)

Fanny: But that doesn't matter to you. What do you care about the time? Twelve o'clock, one o'clock, two o'clock, three o'clock, it's all the same so long as you are enjoying yourself!

Dick (on the point of protesting)

Fanny: It greatly amused you, I daresay, to keep me waiting for you all this long time, and to make me miserable on my birthday. For this is my birthday, though you had forgotten it!

Dick (protests)

Fanny: But you do not deceive me!

Dick (smiles)

Fanny: Yes! Smile! Though it scarcely becomes you!

Dick (his smile broadens)

Fanny: You know that you met Miss Verney at the station when the London train came in.

Dick (amazed)

Fanny: I feel sure of it. No! Don't make matters worse by denying it. And you drove back in the cart with her and dined at "The Hollies" with her people. Horrid, designing girl! I know her too well!

Dick (expostulates)

Fanny (cutting him short): Oh! I know what you were on the point of telling me! That you had been up to London, for the annual dinner of the members of the Board of Trade. And all the members married and venerable. The president himself an octogenarian. Had it only been allowed, the members would have liked to have brought their wives with them.

Dick (half amused, again on the point of speaking)

Fanny: You were bored? But I daresay you made yourself most agreeable! You can be so agreeable, when you like!

Dick (disclaiming)

Fanny: At least, I have been told so.

Dick (shakes his head, smiling)

Fanny: You keep your amiability for others than me.

Dick (approaches Fanny kindly)

Fanny: No! Don't speak to me! I am only your wife, after all! And not altogether plain enough, I suppose, to please you.

Dick——

Fanny: To please you, one must be pale, thin, hideously dressed. After having once seen Flora Verney, it is easy enough to judge of your taste in women! It is evident you like a tailor-made gown, bought at a country linen-draper's!

Dick (shakes his head)

Fanny: And that girl actually dared, yes! dared, to call upon me yesterday!

Dick (inclined to gentleness)

Fanny: You do well to seem as if nothing were the matter! Yet wasn't Dr. Verney, Flora's own father, one of your kindest friends? Didn't he come three times a day to see you when you had the measles? And didn't Flora and I play together as children?

Dick———

Fanny: You can't be aware how everyone remarks upon your being seen so often at the Verneys' house whilst I am here all alone, dull, miserable, fretting myself to death from morning until night. (Up to this moment Fanny has not ceased to speak, pouring out her words without a single pause. But on the last words, "from morning until night," she stops to take breath. Dick concludes it is his turn to speak, and prepares.)

Dick (opens his mouth)

Fanny (continuing rapidly to prevent his speaking): If Dr. Verney likes to keep open house, he is very willing. Everybody is master of his own.

Dick (sinks back discouraged in his attempt)