Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. I, 1889.djvu/67

 John turned and regarded him with astonishment.

"Why, I thought you was as much set against it as me? What's made you come round like this? I s'pose you've got tired of her, an' that's made you so you don't care."

The young man's eyes flashed angrily, but before he could make a rejoinder Mrs. Hewett interposed.

"For shame o' yourself, John! If you can't talk better sense than that, don't talk at all. He don't mean it, Sidney. He's half drove off his head with trouble."

"If he does think it," said Kirkwood, speaking sternly but with self-command, "let him say what he likes. He can't say worse than I should deserve."

There was an instant of silence. Hewett's head hung with more than the usual doggedness. Then he addressed Sidney, sullenly, but in a tone which admitted his error.

"What have you got to say? Never mind me. I'm only the girl's father, an' there's not