human
What's the matter, Jack? Whenever you smoke, your cigar goes out; you read a newspaper by staring over the top of it; you bump into people on the streets, when there is plenty of room for you to pass; you leave your watch under the pillow and have to hike back for it; you forget, you are absent-minded. Now, what's the matter?
gpt
I don't know, Dan,
human
Or you won't tell.
gpt
Perhaps that's more like it.
human
It's that woman, though you will not acknowledge it. By George, I'd like to meet her face to face; I'd give her a piece of my mind.
gpt
Or a piece of your heart!
human
Bah!
gpt
You have not seen her face, Dan; I have.
human
Oh, she may be a queen and all that; but she has an evil influence over all the people she meets. Here's Kitty, following her round, and the Lord knows in what kind of trouble. She has hooked you, and presently you'll be leaving me to get back home the best way I can.
gpt
It is quite possible, my boy.
human
Come, Jack, have you really got it? If you have, why, we'll pack up and leave by the next steamer. I don't care to wander about Italy with a sick man on my hands.
gpt
Don't be hard on me, Dan, pleaded Hillard, smiling now.
human
Think of all the Kitty Killigrews you've poured into my uncomplaining ears!
gpt
I got over it each time.
human
Happy man! And, once you see the face of this adventuress, as you call her, Kitty Killigrew will pass with all the other lasses.
gpt
I? indignantly.
human
Rot! She won't hold a candle to Kitty.
gpt
No, not a candle, but the most powerful light known to the human eye--perfect beauty.
human
There you go again! laughed Merrihew.
gpt
You tack that sigh to everything you say; and that's what I've been complaining about.