"Yes, dearest?"
"I dislike you in that hat, put the blue one on, darling."
A thousand little unexpected things were always cropping up to give rise to these thinly veiled quarrels. Even Milly began to feel uncomfortable and ill at ease, but with I characteristic decision she solved the problem for herself.
"I shan't stay here when I'm bigger, Joan; I shall go away," she announced one day.
Joan was startled; the words made her uneasy, they reopened the eternal question, presenting a new facet. She began to ask herself whether she too did not long to go away, whether she would want to stay at Seabourne when she was older, and above all whether she loved her mother enough to stay for ever in Seabourne. They were sitting in the school-room, and Joan's eyes sought Elizabeth, who answered the unspoken thought. She turned to Joan with a quick, unusual gesture.
"Joan, you mustn't stay here always either."
"Not stay here, Elizabeth? Where should I go?"
"Oh, I don't know; to Cambridge perhaps, and then—oh, well, then you must work, do things with your life."
"But, Mother——"
Elizabeth was silent. Joan pressed her.