He stared at her for a number of seconds, while she met his gaze inflexibly. Then his face broke up, as if a hand had struck it. Light and color came into it, and his mouth trembled.
"Electra," he said, "what do you want me to understand?"
"You do understand it, Peter," she said quietly. "I can hardly think you will force me to state it explicitly."
"You can't mean it! no, you can't. You mustn't imply things, Electra. You imply she was not married to him."
Still Electra was looking at him with that high demeanor which, he felt with exasperation, seemed to make great demands upon him of a sort that implied assumptions he must despise.
"This is very difficult for me," she was saying, and Peter at once possessed himself of one passive hand.
"Of course it is difficult," he cried warmly. "I told her so. I told her everything connected with Tom always was difficult. She knows that as well as we do."
"Have you talked him over with her?" The tone was neutral, yet it chilled him.
"Good Lord, yes! We've done nothing but talk him over from an outside point of view. When she was deciding whether to come here, whether to write you or just present herself as she has—of course Tom's name came into it. She was Tom's wife, wasn't she? Tom's widow?"
"No! no!" said Electra, in a low and vehement denial. "She was not." Peter blazed so that he seemed to tower like a long thin guidepost showing the way to anger. "I said the same thing yesterday."