The drawing-room was just as it had always been.... The same heavy dignity of line in the old walls and oak-ribbed ceiling spoilt by undue crowding of pictures and furniture. Hothouse flowers stood about in pots and filled vases innumerable ... a water-colour portrait of himself as a child faced him as he came into the room.
“Peter, my darling!”
His mother’s arms were stretched out to him from the sofa—she did not rise, and he knelt down beside her for a moment, letting her enfold him and furiously creating for himself the illusion of a mother he had never known. The illusion seemed to dissipate in a faint scent of lavender water.
“How strange you look out of uniform—I suppose that’s a new suit.”
“Well, I could scarcely have got into my pre-war clothes. I weigh thirteen stone.”
“Quite the heavy Squire,” said Sir John. “Come here and let’s have a look at you.”
Peter went over and stood before his father’s chair—rather like a little boy. As it happened he was a man of thirty-six, tallish, well-built, with a dark, florid face, dark hair and a small dark moustache. In contrast his eyes were of an astounding blue—Saxon eyes, the eyes of Alards who had gone to the Crusades, melted down their plate for the White King, refused to take the oath of allegiance to Dutch William; eyes which for long generations had looked out on the marshes of Winchelsea, and had seen the mouth of the Rother swept in spate from Romney sands to Rye.
“Um,” said Sir John.
“Having a bad turn again, Sir?”
“Getting over it—I’ll be about tomorrow.”