‘My Justine’s voice is her own again,’ said Blanche, looking at her sons as if in question of their feeling.
‘Well, Mother, I am not going to be knocked down by this. It is a thing to stand up straight under, indeed. I found the boys in a condition of daze. I was obliged to be a little bracing, though I admit that it affected me in that way at first. This is a change for Uncle, not for ourselves. It is his life that is taking a new turn, though ours will take its subordinate turn, of course, and we must remember to see it as subordinate. But dear Uncle! That he should have come to this at his age! It takes away my breath and makes my heart ache at the same time.’
‘Are we sure of it?’ said Mark.
‘Let us build no further without a foundation,’ said his brother.
‘Look,’ said Justine, leading the way to the window. ‘Look. Oh, look indeed! Here is something else before our eyes. What led me to the window at this moment? It is inspiring, uplifting. I wish we had seen it from the first. We should not have taken our eyes away.’
Edgar was standing on the path, his hands on the shoulders of Maria and his brother, his eyes looking into their faces, his smile seeming to reflect theirs.
‘Is it not a speaking scene? Dear Father! Giving up his place in his brother’s life with generosity and courage. We see the simplicity and completeness of the sacrifice, the full and utter renunciation. It seems that we ought not to look, that the scene should be sacred from human eyes.’
‘So Justine stands on tiptoe for a last glimpse,’ said Aubrey, blinking.
‘Yes, let us move away,’ said his sister, putting his words to her own purpose. ‘Let us turn our eyes on something fitter for our sight,’ She accordingly turned hers on her mother, and saw that Blanche was weeping easily and weakly, as if she had no power to stem her tears.
‘Why, little Mother, it is not like you to be borne away like this. Where is that stoic strain which has put you at our head, and kept you there in spite of all indication to the contrary? Where should it be now but at Father’s service? Where is your place but at his side? Come, let me lead you to the post that will be yours.’
Blanche went on weeping almost contentedly, rather as if her resistance had been withdrawn than as if she had any cause for tears. Aubrey looked on with an uneasy expression and Clement kept his eyes aside.
‘I am quite with Mother,’ said Mark. It is all I can do not to follow her example.’
‘Has the carriage been sent for Aunt Matty?’ said Aubrey.
‘Ought it to be?’ said Blanche, sitting up and using an easier tone than seemed credible. ‘We must ask Miss Sloane to stay to luncheon, and I suppose your aunt must come too. It is she who first brought her to the house. We little knew what would come of it. But not Miss Griffin, Justine dear. We had better be just a family gathering. That is what we shall be, of course, now that Miss Sloane is to be one of us.’
‘We will have it as you say, little Mother. I will send the message. And I commend your taste. It is well to be simply as we are. And in these days there is no risk of the promiscuousness and scantiness which did at intervals mark our board.’ Justine broke off as she recalled that her uncle’s open hand might be withdrawn.
‘Are we to take it as certain that Miss Sloane and Uncle are engaged?’ said Mark. ‘The evidence is powerful, but is it conclusive?’
‘Conclusive,’ said Justine, with a hint of a sigh. ‘Would a woman of Miss Sloane’s age and type be seen on the arm of a man to whom she stood in any other relation? Uncle is not her father or her brother, you know.’
‘Unfortunately not,’ said Clement. ‘That should be a certain preventive.’
‘Come, Clement, it is in Uncle’s life that we shall be living in these next days. He has had enough of living in ours.’
‘It is odd that we are surprised by it,’ said Mark.
‘I suppose we are,’ said Justine, with another sigh. ‘But we have had an example of how to meet it. Father has given it to us. Don’t remind me of that scene, or I shall be overset like Mother.’
‘You were unwise to call it up, but I admit the proof.’
‘Wait one minute,’ said Justine, going to the door. ‘I will be back with confirmation or the opposite. I shall not keep you long.’
‘I must go and make myself fit to be seen,’ said Blanche in her ordinary tone. ‘I have been behaving quite unlike myself. I suppose it was thinking of your uncle, and his having lived so much for all of us, and now at last being about to live for himself.’
‘It is enough to overcome anyone,’ said Clement, when his mother had gone. ‘It puts the matter in a nutshell.’
‘You mean that Uncle may want his own money?’ said Mark.
‘It seems that he must. Nearly all the balance after the allowances are paid has gone on the house. It seemed to need all but rebuilding. Houses were not meant to last so long. Can things be broken off at this stage?’
‘They can at the end of it. I suppose they will have to be. Uncle had very little money of his own. There is so little in the family apart from the place. He was a poor man until he had this money. And he can only use the income; the capital is tied up until his death. And he will want to give his wife the things that go with his means. And she will expect to have them, and why should she not?’
‘Because it prevents Uncle from giving them to us,’ said Aubrey.
‘We do not grudge Uncle what is his own,’
‘We only grudge Miss Sloane what has been ours,’
‘How about your extra pocket money?’ said Clement.
‘I grudge it to her. And I thought she liked Father better than Uncle. She always looks at him more.’
‘I did not think about which she liked better,’ said Mark. ‘I thought of her as Aunt Matty’s friend.’
‘Perhaps she did not find Aunt Matty enough for her.’ said Aubrey. ‘I can almost understand it. Well, we shall have her for an aunt and she will be obliged to kiss Clement.’
‘Well, I bring confirmation,’ said Justine, entering the room in a slightly sobered manner. ‘Full and free support of what we had gathered for ourselves from the full and frank signs of it. It was not grudged or withheld for a moment. I was met by a simple and open admission such as I respected.’
‘And did they respect your asking for it?’ said Clement.
‘I think they did. They saw it as natural and necessary. We could not accept what we could not put upon a definite basis. They could not and did not look for that.’
‘So you did not have much of a scene?’
‘No — well, it was entirely to my taste. It was brief and to the point. There was a natural simplicity and depth about it. I felt that I was confronted by deep experience, by the future in the making. I stood silent before it.’
‘That was well.’
‘Are we all ready for Aunt Matty?’ said Aubrey.
‘Yes, we are not making any change,’ said Justine. ‘That would imply some thought of ourselves. We are meeting today in simple feeling for Uncle.’
‘Just wearing our hearts on our sleeves.’
‘Now, little boy, why are you not at your books?’
‘Penrose is not well. He sent a message. And directly his back was turned I betrayed his trust.’
‘Well, well, it is not an ordinary day. And I suppose that is the carriage. Are we never to have an experience again without Aunt Matty? Now what a mean and illogical speech! When we may owe to her Uncle’s happiness! I will be the first down to welcome her as an atonement.’
‘So you are not too absorbed in the new excitement to remember the old aunt. That is so sweet of all of you. And I do indeed bring you my congratulations. I feel I am rather at the bottom of this. So, Blanche, I have given you something at last. I am not to feel that I do nothing but receive. That is not always to be my lot. I am the giver this time, and I can feel it is a rare and precious gift. And I do not grudge it, even if it may mean yielding up a part of it myself. No, Dudley, it is yours and it is fully given. You and I are both people who can give. That is often true of people who accept. And you find yourself in the second position this time.’