He kissed her affectionately and said:
“Don’t stay up late. I have taken the key, Clare.”
“I hope it will fit the lock when you come back,” said Clare.
She spoke the words very quietly, but for some reason they raised her husband’s ire.
“For heaven’s sake don’t try to be funny, Clare.”
“I wasn’t trying,” said Clare very calmly. For a moment Herbert hesitated. Then he came back to his wife and kissed her.
“I think we are both a bit irritable to-night, aren’t we?”
“Are we?” said Clare.
“Nerves,” said Herbert, “the curse of the age. Well, good-night.”
Just as he was going out, Mollie, the maidservant, came in and said: