"I think it's a very nice place, Charlock House, Augustine. Your father wouldn't have wanted me to live here if he'd imagined that I could find it gloomy, you know."
"Oh, of course not," said the young man, in an impassive, pleasant voice.
"He has always, in everything, been so thoughtful for my comfort and happiness," said Lady Channice.
Augustine did not look at her: his eyes were fixed on the sky outside and he seemed to be reflecting—though not over her words.
"So that I couldn't bear him ever to hear anything of that sort," Lady Channice went on, "that either of us could find it gloomy, I mean. You wouldn't ever say it to him, would you, Augustine." There was a note at once of urgency and appeal in her voice.
"Of course not, since you don't wish it," her son replied.
"I ask you just because it happens that your father is coming," Lady Channice said, "tomorrow;—and, you see, if you had this in your mind, you might have said something. He is coming to spend the afternoon."
He looked at her now, steadily, still pleasantly; but his colour rose.
"Really," he said.
"Isn't it nice. I do hope that it will be fine; these Autumn days are so uncertain; if only the weather holds up we can have a walk perhaps."