"Or would you rather I looked round at once for something else?"
"We can think it over; there's plenty of time."
"There isn't. There isn't plenty of time. You hear what Lulu says; every place will be crowded."
"Must we go where there's a crowd?"
She might have said: "Are we the right people to make holiday alone?" ... but pretence had never yet been completely shattered between them. "If we go when there's a crowd, yes. It can't be avoided in August."
He was silent. And helped his guest to prune jelly and custard.
"Shall I write to Ilfracombe? Do say one way or another"; her voice took on that driving note he so dreaded, and which, against his will, always plunged him into a counter-mood of stagnant negation.
"As you please."
"Is there any place you would prefer?"
Goaded less by her irritation than by its tightly drawn restraint, he let fall: "Alpenruh...."