To her surprise, she found his arm round her waist, and a kiss on her brow. 'I thought I should have caught it,' he said; 'you are not half a fool of a sister after all.'
Aubrey was not in the dining-room; and after having carved, Tom, in some compunction, was going to look for him, when he made his appearance in his uniform.
'Oho!' said the Doctor, surprised.
'There's to be a grand parade with the Whitford division,' he answered; and no more was said.
Not till the eight o'clock twilight of the dripping August evening did the family reassemble. Ethel had been preparing for a journey that Mary and Gertrude were to make to Maplewood; and she did not come down till her father had returned, when following him into the drawing-room, she heard his exclamation, 'Winter again!'
For the fire was burning, Tom was sitting crumpled over it, with his feet on the fender, and his elbows on his knees, and Aubrey in his father's arm-chair, his feet over the side, so fast asleep that neither entrance nor exclamation roused him; the room was pervaded with an odour of nutmeg and port wine, and a kettle, a decanter, and empty tumblers told tales. Now the Doctor was a hardy and abstemious man, of a water-drinking generation; and his wife's influence had further tended to make him—indulgent as he was—scornful of whatever savoured of effeminacy or dissipation, so his look and tone were sharp, and disregardful of Aubrey's slumbers.
'We got wet through,' said Tom; 'he was done up, had a shivering fit, and I tried to prevent mischief.'
'Hm! said the Doctor, not mollified. 'Cold is always the excuse. But another time don't teach your brother to make this place like a fast man's rooms.'
Ethel was amazed at Tom's bearing this so well. With the slightest possible wrinkle of the skin of his forehead, he took up the decanter and carried it off to the cellaret.
'How that boy sleeps!' said his father, looking at him.