Page:Mrs Caudle's curtain lectures.djvu/99

 Rh Chubb, it's all the same—a great deal you must care for us. Yes, it's very well for you to say that you only want the key for peace and quietness—what's it to you, if I like to sit up? You've no business to complain; it can't distress you. Now, it's no use your talking; all I say is this, Caudle: if you send a man to put on any lock here, I'll call in a policeman; as I'm your married wife, I will.

"No, I think when a man comes to have the street-door key, the sooner he turns bachelor altogether the better. I'm sure, Caudle, I don't want to be any clog upon you. Now, it's no use your telling me to hold my tongue, for I—What?

"I give you the headache, do I?

"No, I don't, Caudle; it's your club that gives you the headache; it's your smoke, and your—well! if ever I knew such a man in all my life! there's no saying a word to you! You go out, and treat yourself like an emperor—and come home at twelve at night, or any hour for what I know, and then you threaten to have a key, and—and—and——"

"I did get to sleep at last," says Caudle, "amidst the falling sentences of 'take children into a lodging'—'separate maintenance'—'won't be made a slave of'—and so forth."