Page:Harvey O'Higgins--Silent Sam and other stories.djvu/279

Rh her mother and put her into the background of her new life.

And, to Hetty's mind, it was the mother who had wrecked every plan. Had n't she told Bailey about her husband—"God rest his bones." Had n't she dragged Bailey down to her own free-and-easy tenement-house manner? Had n't she destroyed his awed respect for his wife

"What 's the matter with you, anyway?" Bailey asked her impatiently; and she turned on him in a blazing indignation. "Don't you speak to me like that," she cried. "You have n't married a servant girl."

"I don't know what I have married," he retorted.

"You seem to 've married a mother-in-law," she said. "Go and sit in the kitchen with her. It 's the part of the house you 're most int'rested in."

"That 's a nice sort of talk!"

His reproof put her on her dignity. She saw that she was lowering herself still further in his regard; and thereafter she said nothing. She became self-contained, haughty, silent, and altogether impossible. No endearments could draw an explanation from her, and no impatience provoke her to a retort. She lived a silent protest against the whole situation, and Bailey rapidly found himself reduced to a state of worried misery.

He could no longer enjoy his evening game of cribbage in the dining-room; and yet he played, because he did not wish to hurt Mrs. Joliffe's feelings. He could not enjoy his meals, but he had to pretend, for Mrs.