Nevil watched her contentedly and did not observe the trouble in her face.
“Nevil,” she said at last, “about Charlotte I wonder—do you think––” she stopped and edged a little nearer her husband and slipped her hand in his.
“Well, dear?”
“You don’t think, do you, Nevil, that Charlotte is—is getting like Patricia?”
He put his arm round her and drew her down on the seat.
“You dear silly child, no,” he said, kissing her.
She seemed only half assured and leant her head against him, sighing.
“It is quite, quite different,” he insisted. “Charlotte’s temper is just like anyone else’s, yours or mine, or anyone’s.”
“Yours—you haven’t got one,” she returned with pretended contempt and then lapsed back into her troubled mien, “but I feel so frightened sometimes.”
“My dear, be reasonable. Patricia’s temper isn’t a temper at all. It’s—it’s a possession—a wretched family inheritance. She can’t help it, poor child, any more than she could help a squint or a crooked nose, and she doesn’t inherit it from your mother but only from your step-father, so why on earth you should imagine it likely to crop up in our family I can’t conceive. It’s absurd.”