“Then Sherry pays.”
“But supposing he is an anarchist?”
“Then there is a row. And there will be one. The country is drifting that way. It will, I think, be bloody, but I think, too, it will be brief. Anarchists, you know, maintain that of all prejudices capital and matrimony are the stupidest. What they demand is the free circulation of money and women. As a nation, we are great at entertaining, but we will never entertain that.”
“Why, then, did you not let the beggar rot where he was?” Annandale swiftly and severely inquired.
“Oh, you know, if I had not got him out someone else would have, and I thought it better that the circulation of money should proceed directly from his pocket to mine.”
“You haven’t any stupid prejudices yourself, that’s clear,” said Annandale, helping himself as he spoke to more Scotch. “Sylvia,” he continued, “if I am ever up for murder I will retain Melanchthon Orr.”
Orr laughed. “That retainer will never reach me. You would not hurt a fly.”
“Wouldn’t I?” And Annandale assumed an expression of great ferocity. “You don’t know me. I can imagine circumstances in which I could wade in gore. By the way, I have ordered a revolver.”
“What!”
“Yes, a burglar got in my place the night before last and woke me up. If he comes back and wakes me up again I’ll blow his head off.”
Sylvia looked at him much as she might at a boastful child. “Yes, yes, Arthur, but please don’t take so much of that whisky.”