"Aunt, will you have some beef?" said he, as soon as the soup and fish had been disposed of, anxious to perform the rites of hospitality now for the first time committed to his charge.
"Do not be in a hurry, Frank," said his mother; "the servants will—"
"Oh! ah! I forgot; there are cutlets and those sort of things. My hand is not in yet for this work, aunt. Well, as I was saying about Cambridge—"
"Is Frank to go back to Cambridge, Arabella?" said the countess to her sister-in-law, speaking across her nephew.
"So his father seems to say."
"Is it not a waste of time?" asked the countess.
"You know I never interfere," said the Lady Arabella; "I never liked the idea of Cambridge myself at all. All the de Courcys were Christ Church men; but the Greshams, it seems, were always at Cambridge."
"Would it not be better to send him abroad at once?"
"Much better, I would think," said the Lady Arabella; "but you know, I never interfere: perhaps you would speak to Mr Gresham."
The countess smiled grimly, and shook her head with a decidedly negative shake. Had she said out loud to the young man, "Your father is such an obstinate, pig-headed, ignorant fool, that it is no use speaking to him; it would be wasting fragrance on the desert air," she could not have spoken more plainly. The effect on Frank was this: that he said to himself, speaking quite as plainly as Lady de Courcy had spoken by her shake of the face, "My mother and aunt are always down on the governor, always; but the more they are down on him the more I'll stick to him. I certainly will take my degree: I will read like bricks; and I'll begin to-morrow."