‘Yes, he has to, dear. It makes us slower, of course, but it cannot be helped. We have to be very economical.’
Matty glanced about the room with a faintly derisive smile.
‘No, indeed, Aunt Matty,’ said Justine, answering the look, ‘you are quite wrong. Mother is speaking the simple truth. Strict economy is necessary. There is no pose about it.’
Matty lifted her brows in light enquiry.
‘Now, Aunt Matty, you made the comment in all good faith, as clearly as you could have made it in words, intending it to be so taken. And that being the case, it must be so answered. And my answer is that economy is essential, and that Jellamy works single-handed for that reason.’
‘Is it, dear? Such a lot of answer for such a little question.’
‘It was not the question. It was the comment upon the reply.’
‘No one is to make a comment but you, dear?’
‘Justine does make them,’ murmured Aubrey.
‘Now, little boy, how much did you follow of it?’
‘Upon my word, I do not follow any of it,’ said Oliver.
Sarah leaned back almost in exhaustion, having followed it all. Her husband had kept his eyes down in order not to do so.
‘Well, we mustn’t get too subtle,’ said Justine. ‘They say that that is a woman’s fault, so I must beware.’
Aubrey gave a crow of laughter, checked it, and suffered a choke which exceeded the bounds of convention.
‘Aubrey darling!’ said Blanche, as if to a little child.
‘Now, little boy, now, little boy,’ said Aubrey, looking at his sister with inflamed cheeks and starting eyes.
‘Now, little boy, indeed,’ she said in a grave tone. ‘Poor child!’ said Sarah.
‘What shall I do when there is no one to call me little boy?’ said Aubrey, looking round to meet the general eye, but discovering that it was not on him, and returning to his dinner.
‘Aubrey has a look of Father, Blanche,’ said Matty.
‘I believe you are right, Aunt Matty,’ said Justine, with more than the usual expression. ‘I often see different likenesses going across his face. It has a more elusive quality than any of our faces.’
‘I mean something quite definite, dear. It was unmistakable for the moment.’
‘Yes, for the moment. But the moment after there is nothing there. It is a face which one has to watch for its fleeting moods and expressions. Would not you say so, Father?’
Edgar raised his eyes.
‘Father has to watch,’ said Aubrey, awaiting the proceeding with a grin.
‘What a gallant smile!’ said Clement, unaware that this was the truth.
‘There, Uncle’s smile!’ said Justine.
The quality of the grin changed.
‘And now Grandpa’s! Don’t you see it, Aunt Matty?’
‘I spoke of it, dear. Yes.’
‘And don’t you, Father? You have to look for a moment.’
Edgar again fixed his eyes on his son.
‘There, it has gone! The moment has passed. I knew it would.’
Aubrey had not shared the knowledge, the moment having seemed to him interminable.
‘Father need not watch any longer,’ he said, and would have grinned, if he had dared to grin.
‘The process does not seem to be attended by adequate reward,’ said Mark.
Clement raised his eyes and drew a breath and dropped his eyes again.
‘Clement need not watch any longer either,’ said Aubrey.
‘Now, little boy, you pass out of the common eye.’
Oliver turned his eyes on his grandson.
‘The lad is getting older,’ he said.
‘Now that is indubitably true, Grandpa,’ said Justine. ‘It might be said of all of us. And it is true of him in another sense; he has developed a lot lately. But do take your eyes off him and let him forget himself. This is all so bad for him.’
‘He could not help it, dear,’ said Blanche, expressing the thought of her son.
‘Now are our little affairs of any interest to you?’ said Matty, who had been waiting to interpose and at once arrested Sarah’s eyes. ‘If they are, we have our own little piece of news. We are to have a guest, who is to spend quite a while with us. I am looking forward to it, as I have a good deal of time to myself in my new life. There are many people whom I miss from the old one, though I have others to do their part indeed. And this is one of the first, and one whose place it would be difficult to fill.’
‘We have found a corner for her,’ said Oliver, ‘though you might not think it.’
‘She will have the spare room, of course, Father,’ said Blanche. ‘It is quite a good little room.’
‘Yes, Mother, of course it is,’ said Justine, in a low, suddenly exasperated tone. ‘But it is to be like that. The house is to be a hut and the room a corner, and there is an end of it. Let us leave it as they prefer it. People can’t do more than have what they would choose.’
Matty looked at the two heads inclined to each other, but did not strain her ears to catch the words. Sarah did so and controlled a smile as she caught them.
‘Well, are you going to let me share this advantage with you?’ went on Matty. ‘It is to be a great pleasure in my life, and I hope it will count in yours. There is no great change of companionship round about.’
‘Well, no, I suppose there is not,’ said Justine. ‘We are in the country after all.’
‘So I am not a host in myself,’ said Dudley.
‘It is known to be better for the country to be like itself,’ said Sarah, who found this to be the case, as it was the reason of her acquaintanceship with the Gavestons.
Thomas looked up with a faintly troubled face.
‘This is a very charming person, who has been a great deal with me,’ continued Matty, as if these interpositions did not signify. ‘Her parents have lately died and left her at a loose end; and if I can help her to gather up the threads of her life, I feel it is for me to do it. It may be a thing I am equal to, in spite of my — what shall I call them? — disadvantages.’
‘I always tell you that your disadvantages do not count, Aunt Matty,’ said Justine.
‘I feel that they do, dear. They must to me, you see. But I try not to let them affect other people, and I am glad of any assurance that they do not.’
‘Do you mean Maria Sloane?’ said Blanche. ‘I remember her when we had just grown up and she was a child. She grew up very pretty, and we saw her sometimes when we stayed with you and Father.’
‘She grew up very pretty; she has remained very pretty; and she will always be pretty to me, though she is so to everyone as yet, and I think will be so until she is something more.’
‘It is odd to see Aunt Matty giving her wholehearted admiration to anyone,’ said Justine to Mark. ‘It shows that we have not a complete picture of her.’
‘It also suggests that she has one of us.’
‘It is pleasant to see it in a way.’
‘We may feel it to be salutary.’
‘She has only seen one or two of my many sides,’ said Dudley.
‘Miss Sloane has not married, has she?’ said Blanche.
‘No, she is still my lovely Maria Sloane. I don’t think I could think of her as anything else. A rose by any other name would smell as sweet, but it seems that marriage might be a sort of desecration of Maria, a sort of plucking of the rose.’ Matty ended on an easy note and did not look into anyone’s face.
Sarah regarded her with several expressions, and Blanche with an easy and almost acquiescent one.
‘Mrs Middleton has been plucked,’ murmured Aubrey. ‘Mr Middleton has plucked her.’
Thomas gave a kindly smile which seemed to try to reach the point of amusement.
‘Is she well provided for, Aunt Matty?’ said Justine in a clear tone.
Sarah nodded towards Justine at the pertinence of the question.