Sheila had been far more annoyed about the tea-party at the Haines’ than she would admit. She told herself that the Haines were stuffy, or they would obviously like her better than Janet, and that they were boring and she did not want to go to their house; but the truth was that she disliked Barbara Haines because she made her feel inferior. The colonel she did not mind quite as much. He wasn’t bad, she thought, only he didn’t appreciate people properly. He treated her as if, just because she was pretty, she was less use than other people. Besides, he had been unsympathetic about her going into pictures. Dismissing the subject as if it wasn’t worth talking about. All the same, it was not the colonel but that awful stuck-up Barbara she couldn’t bear. There was, too, her innermost private reason for hating Barbara. It was very annoying that her mother and Janet should take up with her. If they knew everything, which, of course, they couldn’t, they wouldn’t see Barbara, because they would have to be on her side; relations always stood together.

It was natural that breakfast should be a stormy meal. Maggie looked so worn that Janet said in an angry voice: “You didn’t sleep.”

Maggie was on the defensive at once.

“Don’t keep picking on my appearance.”

Sheila poured milk on to her cereal.

“Your own isn’t too good. I can’t think why you make more of a fright of yourself than you are naturally to go and teach that kid.”

Janet had taken particular pains to look prim and tidy; she wanted to look exactly as she had looked last week to give Iris no possible chance to comment, in front of her father, on her looks. She stared at Sheila as though she could have bitten her.

“I’m suitably dressed for my job, which is more than you are in that pink thing, if you’re going to the Labour Exchange today. Nobody would think of you for a good job dressed like that.”

“Who said I was going to the Labour Exchange today?” Maggie seized her chance.

“I do, and you’re starting the moment you’ve eaten your breakfast.”

Sheila looked sulky.

“It was agreed I’d go when I liked.”

“It was not. It was agreed you’d go within a week. You’ve been shilly-shallying for days. It’s fine today, and not too hot. The bus leaves the corner at twenty past nine and you’ll catch it.”

Sheila sighed wearily.

“I didn’t sleep very well, the thunder made me nervous; you know how it does. I’ve rather a headache; I thought I’d stay quiet this morning.”

Maggie glanced at Sheila’s clear, wild-rose skin, and unwillingly hardened her heart, but her voice softened; too well she knew what thunder could do to the nerves.