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personally. You should really have a manservant,’ said Hil-
da as they sat, with apparent calmness, at coffee after dinner.
She spoke in her soft, seemingly gentle way, but Clifford felt
she was hitting him on the head with a bludgeon.
’You think so?’ he said coldly.
’I’m sure! It’s necessary. Either that, or Father and I must
take Connie away for some months. This can’t go on.’
’What can’t go on?’
’Haven’t you looked at the child!’ asked Hilda, gazing at
him full stare. He looked rather like a huge, boiled crayfish
at the moment; or so she thought.
’Connie and I will discuss it,’ he said.
’I’ve already discussed it with her,’ said Hilda.
Clifford had been long enough in the hands of nurses;
he hated them, because they left him no real privacy. And a
manservant!...he couldn’t stand a man hanging round him.
Almost better any woman. But why not Connie?
The two sisters drove off in the morning, Connie looking
rather like an Easter lamb, rather small beside Hilda, who
held the wheel. Sir Malcolm was away, but the Kensington
house was open.
The doctor examined Connie carefully, and asked her all
about her life. ‘I see your photograph, and Sir Clifford’s, in
the illustrated papers sometimes. Almost notorieties, aren’t
you? That’s how the quiet little girls grow up, though you’re
only a quiet little girl even now, in spite of the illustrated pa-
pers. No, no! There’s nothing organically wrong, but it won’t
do! It won’t do! Tell Sir Clifford he’s got to bring you to town,
or take you abroad, and amuse you. You’ve got to be amused,

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