"No—no, thank you, Aunt Maggie."
His voice was absent—or stern; and absently—or sternly—he looked at her across the table.
She caught her breath and hesitated, and began pathetically to try by brightness to rally him from his mood.
"At least you must be terribly hungry," she smiled. "Here comes Honor with just what you like."
A tray tanged against the door, and was borne in by Honor, uncommonly grim of the face.
"Now wasn't that clever of Honor!" Aunt Maggie went on. "Five minutes ago—after waiting since seven—she said she knew you would be just in time if she began to cook the trout then; and here it is ready, and most delicious, I'm sure, just as you arrive."
Honor's actual words had been: "Time and tide wait for no dangerous delays, Miss Oxford, and I don't neither—not a single instant longer. I'll put these troutses on now which ought to have been on at ten minutes to seven, and I'll cook 'em, and cook 'em and cook 'em till I drop fainting on my own kitchen carpet and till they're nasty black cinders that will serve him right. Lost his way! lost his nasty bold temper! It's no good talking different to me, Miss, not if your voice was tinkling trumpets, it isn't!" She had burst in with her tray prepared to repeat her wrath to Percival's face, but caught the appealing look in Aunt Maggie's eyes, perceived that something was seriously amiss with Percival, and exchanged her heat for the affection he had won in her from the first moment, years before, of his arrival—the sweetest bundle of shawls—at "Post Offic."
"Cooked to a turn, Master Percival, dear," Honor said, uncovering before him the steaming dish.
"And only just caught," Aunt Maggie smiled. "Rollo brought them in just before supper time."
And Honor: "And want it you do, as I can see. Nasty pinched look you've got, Master Percival."