“She was,” he said, not yelling now, “and domineering, and spoiled, and suspicious, and greedy, and mean, and unscrupulous, and deceitful, and selfish, and damned bad⁠—altogether damned bad!”

“Any reason for her jealousy?”

“I hope so,” he said bitterly. “I’d hate to think a son of mine would be faithful to her. Though likely enough he was. He’d do things like that.”

“But you don’t know any reason why she should have killed him?”

“Don’t know any reason?” He was bellowing again. “Haven’t I been telling you that⁠—”

“Yeah. But none of that means anything. It’s kind of childish.”

The old man flung the covers back from his legs and started to get out of bed. Then he thought better of it, raised his red face and roared: