The widow
sat apart, feigning to be occupied with a book, but stealthily
observing them from behind her fan; and the two firemen-watermen,
smoking their pipes on the bank hard by, nudged each other, and
grinned in enjoyment of the joke. Very few of the party missed the
loving couple; and the few who did, heartily congratulated each
other on their disappearance.
THE CONTRADICTORY COUPLE
One would suppose that two people who are to pass their whole lives
together, and must necessarily be very often alone with each other,
could find little pleasure in mutual contradiction; and yet what is
more common than a contradictory couple?
The contradictory couple agree in nothing but contradiction. They
return home from Mrs. Bluebottle's dinner-party, each in an
opposite corner of the coach, and do not exchange a syllable until
they have been seated for at least twenty minutes by the fireside
at home, when the gentleman, raising his eyes from the stove, all
at once breaks silence:
'What a very extraordinary thing it is,' says he, 'that you WILL
contradict, Charlotte!' '_I_ contradict!' cries the lady, 'but
that's just like you.' 'What's like me?' says the gentleman
sharply. 'Saying that I contradict you,' replies the lady. 'Do
you mean to say that you do NOT contradict me?' retorts the
gentleman; 'do you mean to say that you have not been contradicting
me the whole of this day?' 'Do you mean to tell me now, that you
have not? I mean to tell you nothing of the kind,' replies the
lady quietly; 'when you are wrong, of course I shall contradict
you.
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