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the place where she did get a car—”
    “He made him self pretty busy on her affairs considering he’s a complete stranger, didn’t he?” exclaimed Marilyn ungraciously.
    “Mari! He’s given me my first moments of relief since she disappeared. How can you talk so? Except for the fact that the driver had his day off today, we could have had the address right away. As it is we must wait until the morning.—Oh, darling, why are you mopping your forehead in that queer way? Is it the reaction? I’m sorry I spoke sharply. I know — I feel pretty limp myself. The relief is almost as painful as the anx iet y. But how kind of that boy— !”
    “It wasn’t just kindness. He’s dead keen on Pat. She said—” Marilyn caught her breath in a great gasp—“she said often enough that—that some goofy fellows just fall for her on sight.”
    “Well, this isn’t a goofy fellow,” replied Clare crisply. “He’s kind and intelligent and bothers about other people, which is more than many do nowadays. If he really leads us to Pat I’ll think him the nearest thing to a knight in shining armour that I’m ever likely to know. I must telephone Greg.”
    “He probably won’t be in,” said Marilyn discouragingly.
    “Why shouldn’t he be ? ” Clare looked surprised. “Well, you don’t suppose he went from here just to sit in a hotel bedroom all the evening, do you?” replied Marilyn rudely. “I expect he’s out at a theatre enjoying himself.”
    “Marilyn, if I didn’t know it was anxiety that was making you so rude and ungracious I’d be really angry! You mustn’t talk of your father like that. He’s just as worried about Pat as I am.”
    “Then he could have stayed here and kept us company,” retorted Marilyn, and she looked rather as though she were going to cry.
    “Dear—” Clare sought desperately for the right words to explain the wrong actions—“it isn’t so simple as that. You see—”
    “It’s perfectly simple!” cried Marilyn, all her worry and weariness and fright suddenly boiling up into furious anger. “The simple fact is that he doesn’t want to bother about any of us. He wants a nice, charming irresponsible life where everyone makes a fuss of him and flatters him and makes him feel good. That’s why he walked out on us all !”
    She stopped as abruptly as she had started and a complete, shocked silence filled the room like something tangible.
    “I’m sorry,” Marilyn muttered at last. “I shouldn’t have said that, but—”
    “I’m glad you did,” Clare said slowly. “Because it’s almost exactly what I said—often. Oh, much, much too often! It seemed to me then the exact and bitter truth. It gave me a sort of dreadful importance to be always the injured party. Only, if you cast yourself for the role of injured party, the sole way to preserve your significance and identity is to cherish the injuries. It’s the most utterly soul-destroying thing in any relationship, justified or unjustified. I know that now.”
    Marilyn stared fascinatedly at her mother.
    “But he—he was in the wrong, wasn’t he?” she said at last.
    “Yes. And so was I.” Clare drew a long sigh. “It’s never all on one side, Mari. I suppose I knew that, in a way. I wasn’t so stupid as not to know at least that. But what you know and what governs your behaviour when you’re bitter and angry are two quite different things. I can’t tell you how strange it was to hear you using almost my own words. They sounded logical and justified in my own mouth. But when someone else says them they have a hollow ri ng.
    “I thought they sounded pretty good when I said them !” Marilyn grinned faintly at her mother.
    “There’s a bit of truth in them, darling. Don’t think I’m pretending anything else.” Clare smiled at her child. “But a bit of truth can sometimes be worse than a completely wrong statement. It’s not easy to see and accept one’s own mistakes. Still less is it easy to explain