Manson was at his desk and still in his Sunday best. He had taken the flower out of his buttonhole and laid it on a printed notice of the next assize court. She stood looking at him, their faces almost level—such was his great bulk.
"Peter," she said gravely, "I want to talk to you."
Something in her manner impressed him and he pushed back his chair.
"What is it?"
"We don't seem to have much time to talk nowadays."
"There's no reason we shouldn't."
"That's just it—but we don't. Now I want to ask you something and,
Peter, you mustn't put me off—as you always do.
"It's about ourselves," she went on, with a long breath, "but principally about you—and it concerns the children. Everything's changed and you're not what you used to be and something has come between us. I don't feel any more that we're the most important things in your life—as I used to."
He shook his head grimly. "You're all more important than ever, if you only knew it." Manson had a faint sense of injustice. It was for them he was wading through depths of anxiety. "You're shortly going to get the surprise of your life," he added with a note of triumphant conviction.
"Is it money?" she said slowly.
He nodded. "Yes, a pile of it."