“Nothing actual yet,” he interrupted her impatiently; “perhaps nothing you would bother about. But you'd be wrong. It's all in his thoughts—some damned spoiled ideal, and as dangerous as possible.”
“Poor Claire,” she said.
“Of course, that's the thing to say,” he agreed. “The man is always a criminal in such situations.”
“You are not trying to defend him?” she asked quietly.
“Maybe I am; I don't know. After all, we are jumping at conclusions; Peyton was drunk. But, for heaven's sake, if either of them comes to you don't just be moral. Try to understand what may have happened. If you lecture them they will leave you like a shot.”
Fanny was driving, and she moved one hand from the wheel to his cheek. “It isn't us, anyhow, Lee; and that is really all I care for. We are closer than others, different. I don't know what I'd do if you should die first—I couldn't move, I couldn't go on.”
“You would have the children,” he reminded her.
“They are nothing compared with you.” It was the only time she had made such an admission, and it moved him profoundly. It at once surcharged him with gratitude and an obscure disturbance.
“You mustn't pin so much to me,” he protested; “you ought to think of a hundred other things.”
“I would if I could; I often try, but it is impossible. It is terrible to care for a man the way I do for you; and that's why I am so glad you are what you are: silly at times, ridiculously impressionable, but not at all like George Willard, or Peyton Morris.”