"Not since----," he rapped out. He was surveying her sternly now.
"But--but--," she faltered again, "--it's only me, Edgar--I _am_ connected with the paper, you know--that is to say my husband is----"
"And--and--I should have come before--I've been intending to come--but I've been so busy----"
But that also he brushed aside for the little it was worth. "_Must_ you compromise yourself like this?" he demanded. "Don't you see? I'm not made of wood, and I suppose your eyes are open too. Prang may be here at any moment. He'll see that notice on the door, and wait ... and then he'll see you go out. You oughtn't to have come," he continued gloomily. "Why did you, Amory?"
Once more she quailed before the blue mica of his eye. Her words came now a bit at a time. The victory was his.
"Only to--to see--how the paper was going on--and to--to talk things over--," she said.
He strode forward from the mantelpiece and approached the desk at which she sat.
"I suppose Cosimo wants to know; very well. As a matter of fact I'm rather glad you've come. Look here----"
He grabbed a newspaper from the desk and thrust it almost roughly into her hands.
"Read that," he said, stabbing the paper with his finger.
The part in which he stabbed it was so unbrokenly set that it must have struck Katie Deedes as overwhelmingly learned.--"There you are--read that!" he ordered her.
Then, striding back to the mantelpiece, he stood watching her as if he had paid for a seat in a playhouse and had found standing-room only.
Amory supposed that it must be something in that close and grey-looking oblong that was at the bottom of his imperious curtness. She was sure of this when, before she had read half a dozen lines, he cut in with a sharp "Well? I suppose you see what it means to us?"
"Just a moment," she said bewilderedly; "you always did read quicker than I can----"
"Quicker!--" he said. "Just run your eye down it. That ought to tell you."
She did so, and a few capitals caught her eye.
"Do you mean this about the North-West Banks?" she asked diffidently.
"I do wish you'd explain it to me. It seems rather hard."
But he did not approach and point out particular passages. Instead he seemed to know that leaden oblong by heart. He gave a short laugh.