I heard myself speaking in a hard cool voice.
'If you don't think we are happy it would be much better if you would admit it.
I don't want you to pretend anything.
I'd much rather go away.
Not live with you any more.'
It was not really happening of course.
It was the girl in the play talking, not me to Maxim.
I pictured the type of girl who would play the part.
Tall and slim, rather nervy.
'Well, why don't you answer me?' I said.
He took my face in his hands and looked at me, just as he had before, when Frith had come into the room with tea, the day we went to the beach.
'How can I answer you?' he said.
'I don't know the answer myself.
If you say we are happy, let's leave it at that.
It's something I know nothing about.
I take your word for it.
We are happy. All right then, that's agreed!'
He kissed me again, and then walked away across the room. I went on sitting by the window, stiff and straight, my hands in my lap.
'You say all this because you are disappointed in me,' I said.
'I'm gauche and awkward, I dress badly, I'm shy with people.
I warned you in Monte Carlo how it would be.
You think I'm not right for Manderley.'
'Don't talk nonsense,' he said.
'I've never said you dressed badly or were gauche.
It's your imagination.
As for being shy, you'll get over that.
I've told you so before.'
'We've argued in a circle,' I said, 'we've come right back to where we started.
This all began because I broke the cupid in the morning-room.
If I hadn't broken the cupid none of this would have happened.
We'd have drunk our coffee, and gone out into the garden.'
'Oh, damn that infernal cupid,' said Maxim wearily.
'Do you really think I care whether it's in ten thousand pieces or not?'
'Was it very valuable?'
'Heaven knows.
I suppose so.
I've really forgotten.'
'Are all those things in the morning-room valuable?'
'Yes, I believe so.'
'Why were all the most valuable things put in the morning-room?'
'I don't know. I suppose because they looked well there.'
'Were they always there?
When your mother was alive?'
'No. No, I don't think they were.
They were scattered about the house.
The chairs were in a lumber room I believe.'
'When was the morning-room furnished as it is now?'
'When I was married.'
I suppose the cupid was put there then?'
I suppose so.'