He was adopting the injured magisterial tone of the man who is ridiculously trying to conceal from himself and others that he has recently behaved like an ass.
She resented the injustice. “I don’t think you need talk like that,” she said.
“Like what?” he bullied her, determined that she should be in the wrong.
And what a hard look on his pretty face!
Her prudence bade her accept the injustice. She was his. Rapt away from her own world, she was utterly dependent on his good nature.
“I knocked my chin against the damned balustrade, coming upstairs,” said Gerald, gloomily.
She knew that was a lie. “Did you?” she replied kindly. “Let me bathe it.”