His recollections of the scene were so spicy that—for once—he was dreadfully affectionate to the brother who had given him such prurient pleasure.
"Ern in trouble of course!" cried the mother angrily. "You needn't tell me! A nice credit to his home and all! I'm ashamed to look Mr. Pigott in the face come Sunday!'
"Now then, mother!" grumbled Mr. Caspar. "Let the boy alone!"
"Yes, you're always for him!" flared Mrs. Caspar, buttering the bread. "Setting him against his mother! But for you he'd be all right."
Alf sat like a little wizened devil at the end of the table in his high chair, his eyes twinkling malignantly over his bib, enjoying the fun.
"It's him and Ern against you and me, mum, ayn't it?" he cried, shuffling on his seat.
Whether it was his son's accent or a sense of the tragic truth underlying his child's words, that affected him, Mr. Caspar rose and shuffled out of the kitchen into the study, which was looked on in the family as dad's sanctuary.
The scene had taken place in the kitchen at tea, which was the one meal the family shared. Breakfast, dinner, supper, Edward Caspar had by himself in the little back room looking out on the fig-tree; and Mrs. Caspar waited on him.
That was by her desire, not his: for from the start of their married life Anne had determined that, so far as in her lay, her husband should have everything just as he was accustomed to. Thus from earliest infancy the children had been taught by their mother to understand that the two sitting-rooms were sacred to dad, and never to be entered except by permission. Their place was the kitchen. She herself set the example by always knocking on the door of either room before entering.
And the atmosphere of these two rooms was radically different from that of the rest of the house. Anne knew it and rejoiced. Everywhere else the tobacconist's daughter reigned obviously supreme. These rooms were the habitat of a scholar and a gentleman. The little back-room, indeed, was remarkable for little but the solidity of its few articles of furniture, and the old silver salver with the crest, reposing on the mahogany side-board. But the front sitting-room, with the bow-window looking out on to Beech-hangar and the long spur of the Downs that hid Beau-nez from view, was known in the family as the study, and looked what it was called.