Clive, Joan, and Cuthbert entered. Cuthbert was in a
white silk tunic embroidered with blue, he wore white shoes and white
silk socks. His golden curls shone. He looked angelic.
"Oh, the darling!"
"Isn't he adorable?"
"What a _picture_!"
"Come here, sweetheart."
Cuthbert was quite used to this sort of thing.
They were more delighted than ever with him when they discovered his
lisp.
His manners were perfect. He raised his face, with a charming smile,
to be kissed, then sat down on the sofa between Joan and Mrs. Clive,
swinging long bare legs.
William, sitting, an unwilling victim, on a small chair in a corner of
the room, brushed and washed till he shone again, was conscious of a
feeling of fury quite apart from the usual sense of outrage that he
always felt upon such an occasion. It was bad enough to be washed till
the soap went into his eyes and down his ears despite all his
protests. It was bad enough to have had his hair brushed till his head
smarted. It was bad enough to be hustled out of his comfortable jersey
into his Eton suit which he loathed. But to see Joan, _his_ Joan,
sitting next the strange, dressed-up, lisping boy, smiling and talking
to him, that was almost more than he could bear with calmness.
Previously, as has been said, he had received Joan's adoration with
coldness, but previously there had been no rival.
"William," said his mother, "take Joan and Cuthbert and show them your
engine and books and things.
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