A dim impression of this, indeed, flashed
across the young woman's heated brain. But before she could speak,
Fleming said:
'Tut, tut, my dear girl! you are talking too loud altogether. Do you want
to attract the attention of everybody on the deck? You mustn't make a
scandal in this way on board ship.'
'Scandal!' she cried. 'We will soon see whether there will be a scandal
or not. Attract the attention of those on deck! That is exactly what I am
going to do, until I show up the villainy of this man you are talking to.
He was the concocter of it, and he knows it. She never had brains enough
to think of it. He was too much of a coward to carry it through himself,
and so he set her to do his dastardly piece of work.'
'Well, well,' said Fleming, 'even if he has done all that, whatever it
is, it will do no good to attract attention to it here on deck. See how
everybody is listening to what you are saying. My dear girl, you are too
angry to talk just now; the best thing you can do is to go down to your
state-room.'
'Who asked you to interfere?' she cried, turning furiously upon him.
'I'll thank you to mind your own business, and let me attend to mine. I
should have thought that you would have found out before this that I am
capable of attending to my own affairs.'
'Certainly, certainly, my dear child,' answered the politician
soothingly; 'I'm sorry I can't get you all to come and have a drink with
me, and talk this matter over quietly.
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