Peter jumped to his feet and faced Clare: Clare in a fur cap from beneath which her golden hair seemed to burn in anger, from beneath which her eyes, furiously attacked his. Of course she had heard him talking to the baby about Cornwall. They had quarrelled about it before ... he had thought that she was at her silly tea-party. His face that had been, a few moments before, gentle, humorous, happy, now suddenly wore the sullen defiance of a sulky boy.
Her breast was heaving, her little hands beat against her frock.
“He shan't,” she broke out at last, “hear about it.”
“Of all the nonsense,” Peter answered her slowly. “Really, Clare, sometimes I think you're about two years old—”
“He shan't hear about it,” she repeated again. “You don't care—you don't care what I think or what I say—I'm his mother—I have the right—”
The baby looked at them both with wondering eyes and to any outside observer would surely have seemed the eldest of the three. Clare's breath came in little pants of rage—“You know—that I hate—all mention of that place—those people. It doesn't matter to you—you never think of me—”
“At any rate,” he retorted, “if you were up here in the nursery more often you would be able to take care that Stephen's innocent ears weren't insulted with my vulgar conversation—”
It was then that he saw, behind Clare, in the doorway, the dark smiling face of Cards.
Cards came forward. “Really, you two,” he said, laughing. “Peter, old man, don't be absurd—you too, Clare” (he called her Clare now).
The anger died out of Clare's eyes: “Well, he knows I hate him talking about that nasty old town to the baby—” Then, in a moment, she was smiling again—“I'm sorry, Peter. Cards is quite right, and anyhow the baby doesn't understand—”