(Clitheroe sits down in the lounge, lights a cigarette, and looks thoughtfully into the fire. Nora takes things from the table, placing them on the chest of drawers. There is a pause, then she swiftly comes over to him and sits beside him.)

NORA (softly). A penny for them, Jack!

CLITHEROE. Me? Oh, I was thinkin’ of nothing.

NORA. You were thinkin’ of th’ . . . meetin’ . . . Jack. When we were courtin’ an’ I wanted you to go, you’d say, “Oh, to hell with meetin’s,” an’ that you felt lonely in cheerin’ crowds when I was absent. An’ we weren’t a month married when you began that you couldn’t keep away from them.

CLITHEROE. Oh, that’s enough about th’ meetin’. It looks as if you wanted me to go, th’ way you’re talkin’. You were always at me to give up th’ Citizen Army, an’ I gave it up ;