She said curtly, and with finality:
"Oh, no! I won't have it."
Edwin did not quite like this. The matter concerned him alone, and he was an absolutely free agent. She ought to have phrased her objection differently. For example, she might have said: "I hope he has refused."
Still, his annoyance was infinitesimal.
"The poor boy works quite hard enough as it is," she added, with delicious caressing intonation of the first words.
He liked that. But she was confusing the issue. She always would confuse the issue. It was not because the office would involve extra work for him that he had declined the invitation, as she well knew.
Of course Auntie Hamps said in a flash:
"If it means overwork for him I shouldn't dream--" She was putting the safety of appearances beyond doubt.
"By the way, Auntie," Hilda continued. "What's the trouble about the pew down at chapel? Both Clara and Maggie have mentioned it."
"Trouble, my dear?" exclaimed Auntie Hamps, justifiably shocked that Hilda should employ such a word in the presence of Mr. Peartree. But Hilda was apt to be headlong.