Aunt Mary en Fête. May Robson as “Aunt Mary.”
Aunt Mary descended the stairs about half-past nine; she thought it was about a quarter to eight, but the difference between the hour that it was and the hour that she thought that it was will be all the same a hundred years from now.
Jack came out of the Louis XIV. drawing room when he heard her step in the hall. There was another young man with him.
“This is my friend Burnett, Aunt Mary,” her nephew roared. “You must excuse his not bowing lower, but you know he broke his collarbone recently.”
Aunt Mary shook hands warmly; she knew all about the ribs and the collarbone, because they had formed big items in the testimony which had momentarily and as momentously relegated Jack to the comradeship of the devil himself, in her eyes. However, she recalled them merely as facts now—not at all in a disagreeable way—and gave Burnett an extra squeeze of good-fellowship, as she said:
“You had a narrow escape, young man.”
“I didn’t have any escape at all,” said Burnett. “The escape went down at the back, and I had to jump from a cornice.”
“Burnett is going out to dine with us, Aunt Mary,” said Jack. “There’s so little he can eat on account of his ribs that he’s a good dinner guest for me.”
Jack’s aunt felt vaguely uncomfortable over this allusion to her grand-nephew’s circumstances, and coughed in slight embarrassment.