“I’ll take a glass of claret. Claret never hurt any man yet. My old grandfather never touched anything else, the last years of his life, and he lived to be eighty-five. You’ll find the bottle in the corner-cupboard. Bring it over here where I can lay my hand on it.”
She brought him the bottle, and a glass, and set both down on the table, retiring again to her stance before the fire Penhallow heaved himself round in bed to reach the bottle, cursing her in a genial way for not pouring the wine out for him, and filled his glass. He drank it off, refilled the glass, and disposed himself more comfortably against his pillows. “Now, what’s the matter with you, eh? Do you think I haven’t had my fill of silly women this day?”
“You’re nothing but a bully,” she remarked, looking scornfully at him. “Why don’t you take it out on someone more capable of defending herself than Faith?”
“Daresay I will,” he retorted. “You, if you annoy me. You’re as discontented as she is. Spoilt, that’s the matter with you! Spoilt!”
“Spoilt! In this house? No one is considered here but you, and well you know it! That’s what I’ve come to talk about. I can’t and I won’t stand it any longer. This isn’t my home, and never will be. I want to go.”
“What’s stopping you?” he inquired amiably.
“You are!” she flung back at him. “You know very well nothing would make me leave Eugene.”
He lay sipping his wine, and grinning. “He’s his own master, ain’t he? Why don’t you get him to take you away if you don’t like it here?”
She felt her control over her too-quick temper slipping, and exerted herself to retain it. “Eugene isn’t strong enough to earn his own living without help,” she said. “He’s never got over that illness.”
“You mean he’s always fancying himself sick,” he jibed. “I know Eugene! A lazy young devil he always was and always will be! For a sensible girl, you’ve made a mess of handling him, my dear. If you didn’t want to stay here, you shouldn’t have let him come down here in the first place.”