"Too bad about you. You look like a poor, unhappy thing--half-fed and half-clothed."
"Now that you have ’built up,’" continued Alice, "and brought me into a circle not in the least of my choosing, and instructed me again and again to ’keep our end up,’ you complain of ’reckless extravagance.’"
"Well, for a woman that I took with a travelling suit from a bankrupt father, and put at the head of this establishment, you certainly can hold your ’end up,’" laughed MacBirney harshly.
"Just a moment," returned Alice, with angry eyes. "You need not taunt me about my father. When you were measuring every day the sugar and coffee we were to use during the first five years of our married life, you should have foreseen you couldn’t move as a millionaire among multimillionaires without spending a lot of money."
MacBirney turned white. "Thank you for reminding me," he retorted, with shining teeth, "of the thrift of which you have since had the advantages."
"Oh dear, no, Walter. The advantages of that kind of thrift are purely imaginary. The least spark of loving-kindness during those years would have been more to me than all the petty meannesses necessary to build up a fortune. But it is too late to discuss all this."
MacBirney could hardly believe his ears. He rose hastily and threw himself into another chair. "You’ve changed your tune mightily since ’the first five years of our married life,’" he said.
"But I want you to understand, _I_ haven’t."
"And I’ve brought you to time before now, with all of your high airs, and I’ll do it again."
"I’ll teach you who is master under this roof."
"How like the sweet first five years that sounds!"
He threw his cigar angrily away. "I know exactly what’s the matter with you. You have run around with this lordly Kimberly till he has turned your head. Now you are going to stop it, now and here!"
"Hadn’t you better tell Mr. Kimberly that?"
"I will tell _you_, you are getting yourself talked about, and it is going to stop. Everybody is talking about you."
Alice threw back her head. "So? Where did you hear that?"
"I hope you were manly enough to defend your wife. Where did you see Lambert?"
"I shouldn’t listen to silly gossip from Lambert, and I shouldn’t see Lambert again."
