Just at that moment, however, there were new and very firm lines in her face.
"Henry," she said sternly, "you are purposely fencing with me.

Mr.
Lessingham's taste in clothes, or Jimmy Dumble's comings and goings, are not what I want to hear or talk about.

You went to London, unwillingly enough, to keep your promise to me.

I want to know whether you have succeeded in getting anything from the Admiralty ?" "Nothing but the cold shoulder, my dear," he answered with a little chuckle.
"Do you mean to say that they offered you nothing at all ?" she persisted.

"You may have been out of the service too long for them to start you with a modern ship, but surely they could have given you an auxiliary cruiser, or a secondary command of some sort ?" "They didn't even offer me a washtub, dear," he confessed.