“I just—­just thought I would—­look in,” Clarence said slowly but steadily.  “Didn’t want to miss anything.  You all seem to be having—­having a pretty good time!”

“It’s been a lovely tea,” Rachael assured him enthusiastically.  “But I’m just going.  Billy’s out here on the porch with a bunch of youngsters; I was just going after her.  Don’t let Frank give you any more of that stuff, Clancy.  Stop it, Frank!  It always gives him a splitting headache!”

The tone was irreproachably casual and cheerful, but Clarence scowled at his wife significantly.  His dignity, as he answered, was tremendous.

“I can judge pretty well of what hurts me and what doesn’t, thank you, Rachael,” he said coldly, with a look ominous with warning.

“That’s just what you can’t, dear,” Mrs. Whittaker, who had joined the group, said pleasantly.  “Take that stuff away, Frank, and don’t be so silly!  If Frank,” she added to the group, “hadn’t been at it all afternoon himself he wouldn’t be such an idiot.”

“Greg says he’ll take us home, Clarence,” Rachael said, in a matter-of-fact tone.  “It’s a shame to carry you off when you’ve just got here, but I’m going.”

“Where’s Billy?” Clarence asked stubbornly.

“Right here!” his wife answered reassuringly.  And to her great relief Billy substantiated the statement by coming up to them, a little uneasy, as her stepmother was, over her father’s appearance, yet confident that there was no real cause for a scene.  To get him home as fast as possible, and let the trouble, whatever it might be, break there, was the thought in both their minds.

“Had enough tea, Monkey?” said Rachael pleasantly, aware of her husband’s sulphurous gaze, but carefully ignoring it.  “Then say day-day to Aunt Gertrude!”

“If Greg takes you home, send Alfred back with the runabout for me,” Billy suggested.

“So that you can stay a little longer, eh?” said Clarence, in so ugly a tone and with so leering a look for his daughter that Rachael’s heart for a moment failed her.  “That’s a very nice little plan, my dear, but, as it happens, I came over in the runabout!  I’m a fool, you know,” said Clarence sullenly.  “I can be hoodwinked and deceived and made a fool of—­oh, sure!  But there’s a limit!  There’s a limit,” he said in stupid anger to his wife.  “And if I say that I don’t like certain friendships for my daughter, it means that I don’t like certain friendships for my daughter, do you get me?  That’s clear enough, isn’t it, Gertrude?”

“It’s perfectly clear that you’re acting like an idiot, Clancy,” Mrs. Whittaker said briskly.  “Nobody’s trying to hoodwink you; it isn’t being done this year!  You’ve got an awful katzenjammer from the Stokes’ dinner, and all you men ought to be horsewhipped for letting yourselves in for such a party.  Now if you and Rachael want to go home in the runabout, I’ll send Billy straight after you with Kenneth or Kent—­”