He knew this to be a sound and sensible plan, but he did not in the least wish to assent to it. In the first place, it would look as if he acknowledged some basis of reason in his wife’s attitude the evening before; in the second place, he would no longer have those half-hours after dinner in his library with Norah and her brother. He knew that they had become the pearl of the day to him.
‘But since people are such fools,’ he said, ‘does it matter?’
‘Yes. I think it does. I don’t want to make unpleasantness.’
‘For me?’ he asked. ‘You make none.’
She flushed a little.
‘Yes. Personally I don’t care two straws. But Charles does rather.’
Keeling stood up.
‘I’m ashamed of myself,’ he said. ‘Your brother is perfectly right. Go down, then, as you suggest in the morning.’
‘We’ll settle it like that then,’ she said. ‘But I am so sorry. I liked those evenings.’
‘I didn’t object to them myself,’ said he. As she turned, their eyes met again, and Norah knew she had done right. But that knowledge gave her no atom of satisfaction.