When his mother rose, Val had a tremendous impulse to rise too and say: “Look here! I’m going to see you jolly well treat her decently.” He subdued it, however; heard her saying, “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” and looked up. She made a rich figure of it, in her furs and large hat, with a slight flush on her cheekbones, calm, matter-of-fact; and he felt proud of her thus confronting all these “confounded lawyers.” The examination began. Knowing that this was only the preliminary to divorce, Val followed with a certain glee the questions framed so as to give the impression that she really wanted his father back. It seemed to him that they were “foxing Old Bagwigs finely.”

And he received a most unpleasant jar when the Judge said suddenly:

“Now, why did your husband leave you⁠—not because you called him ‘the limit,’ you know?”