"Lawrence!" Her voice was full of warm gladness.
He was hanging his hat in its place.
"Hello, Claire. Back, are you?" His voice held the impersonal, sullen note that he used of late. "Where is Philip?"
"Why, didn't he find you?"
Lawrence was immediately angry. He thought, "Why should Philip be hunting for me? I don't need his care. Can't I even go out without a guardian?"
"I didn't see him," he returned, aloud.
"I sent him to find you." She was standing looking at him, her whole figure expressing love and relief at his return.
He was too angry to catch the fine warmth of her voice, and his inability to see handicapped him more at that moment than at any time in his life.
"I sent him to find you," she said again.
"He didn't. I came back as I went, alone."