It was, to the identical phrases, the quarrel of their whole short turbulent married life. He had always made her feel that she was pig-headed and unreasonable not to yield at once to his superior knowledge of her own inmost wishes. The trouble was that the turmoil and the fighting slowly extinguished her own wishes--they weren't changed, they were killed--so that after a little while she was left gallantly defending a corpse; she ceased to care what happened; whereas Valentine's poignant interest grew with each word he uttered--and he uttered a great many--until he seemed to burn with an almost religious conviction that she must not do the thing in the way she wanted to do it. It always ended the same way: "Now, my dear girl, don't be so obstinate." Was she obstinate? she wondered; and as she wondered Valentine rushed in like an army through a breach in the wall. He was doing it now. "All I ask," he was saying, "is that you should look at the set of plans I had my man draw--he's a real architect--not a bungalow wizard like that fellow you employed. Now you might at least do that--it isn't much to ask that you should just look at them. Oh, well, you'll see they call for another piece of land, but honestly, Cora, I cannot let you settle on that switching yard, that you picked out--" She could not refuse to look at his plans; in fact, she was not a little touched by the idea that he had taken such an infinity of trouble for her. And at this instant Thorpe entered. Valentine shouted at him to get that other roll of plans from his room. "Yes, sir," said Thorpe, "directly; but the message has come that the steamer is docking and I've sent for a taxi, sir." Valentine collected himself. "Oh, yes, the steamer," he said, and then he glanced at Cora. "I don't think I'll go to the steamer, Thorpe." Cora's heart rose; she knew that look, that tone; he did not want to go. She looked at Thorpe; not a muscle of his face had changed, and yet she knew he was in opposition. "Yes, sir," he said. "Would you have any objection if I went to the dock? I doubt if the princess will understand the American customs without assistance, sir." There was a little pause. "The princess?" said Cora. Valentine waved toward the photograph on the desk. "She's coming--Hungarian princess. Great stuff, if she's as per invoice. I'm sending her to China for the syndicate. Hun to Hun, you know. Good idea, isn't it? Thorpe told me about her. He lived with her uncle when he was ambassador in London; the uncle, you know, not Thorpe--though why not?" Valentine rose. The recital of the facts in the case of the princess had revived his interest in her.