Claire had a slim low-breasted figure, gracefully
broad shoulders; and her face, it might be because of its definite,
almost sharp, outline, held the stamp of decided opinions. Claire's
appearance, he recognized, her bearing, gave an impression of arrogance
which, however, was only superficially true--she could be very
disagreeable in situations, with people, that she found inferior,
brutally casual and unsympathetic; but more privately, intimately, she
was remarkably simple-hearted, free from reserve. She was related to
Lee through her father, a good blood, he told himself; but her mother
had brought her a concentration of what particular vigorous
aristocracy--an unlimited habit of luxury without the responsibility of
acknowledged place--the land afforded.
The drinks had been consumed, the soup disposed of, when Claire said
abruptly, "Peyton is going to leave me."
Although, in a way, Lee had been prepared for such an announcement, the
actuality upset him extremely. Fanny gasped, and then nodded warningly
toward the waitress, leaving the dining-room; at any conceivable
disaster, he reflected, Fanny would consider the proprieties.
"When did he tell you?" Fanny demanded.
"He didn't," Claire replied; "I told him. It was a great relief to both
of us."
"Say what you like outside," Lee put in vigorously; "but at least with
us be honest."
"I am, quite," she assured him; "naturally I don't want Peyton to go--I
happen to love him.
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