“Would you have said that during the war, Ursula? Why, I think it was splendid how every one hid their own feelings and were cheerful.” Miss Roberts, having been officially given charge of the situation by Grace--who had not got it to give--and asked to take care of it until a quarter to six, was feeling the hours unwontedly taut and thrilling. “This isn’t the war. It’s _us_.” [VIII] MR. MAXWELL and Stanley returned together from the golf-house about six o’clock, and were at once anxiously taken possession of by their wives. Presently, Hal received the summons he expected to the study. It was not to be the old thunderous “You young rascal” business, such as Bunny always encountered, but a Serious Talk; the kind that began: “Don’t be afraid of me, my boy....” Hal _was_ afraid. A wrathful parent was a thing that might happen to any fellow. There was, however, a strange solemnity, proving his crime in an unspeakable category, about a father who suddenly treated him as an equal. “I want your confidence, my boy. After all, I’m your father. What was your motive?” If Hal had kept the money to extricate himself from some tangible male scrape--such as a bar-maid--he might have been able to respond to the spirit of gruff intimacy which the crisis had brought about. It was obviously impossible to pour out in his own defence a lot of vaporous drivel about Michaelmas daisies and the goodness of God. He was miserably certain in his own mind that his father was going to drag in religion pretty soon--_real_ religion, the Sunday kind. And sure enough, Tom Maxwell, really staggered in his pride and his safe trust in permanence, by Hal’s lapse from everyday honesty, was unable to find any other contribution to the scene than the Eighth Commandment. “Yes, I know,” muttered Hal. For the last six years they had talked only of sport: cricket, football, boxing, rowing, and, occasionally, to humour the older man, golf. On this basis, they had presented an appearance of chumminess which, the world declared, was so typical of the modern unformidable relations between two generations. Now--“Can I go, father?” “Suppose it gets talked about round here? Suppose your Aunt Lavvy refuses.... Your future career.... A good name travels by road, a bad name by express.” Mr. Maxwell was too dispirited even to disavow his originality by a pretence of inverted commas. Hal’s dread of public humiliation did not stretch beyond Winborough. That was bad enough, and too bad to face. Home was only an episode that occurred three times a year. Mr. Maxwell went slowly back to his wife, and closed the bedroom door behind him. “He won’t confess. I did my best.” “She’ll tell.” Florrie Maxwell, with shaking fingers, tried to fasten up her plentiful black hair.