"What a prickly aunt!" said Evie. "Dear Aunt Violet, if Geoffrey and the beloved physician and Jim weren't such darlings, all of them, I should be jealous of them—I should indeed."
"What a lot of darlings you have, Evie!" said the other.
"I know I have. I wish there were twice as many. For the whole point of the world is the darlings. A person with no darlings is dead—dead and buried. And the more darlings you have, by so much the more is the world alive. Isn't it so? I have lots—oh, and the world is good! All those I have, and you, and Harry even, and I might include my own Geoff. Also Uncle Bob, especially when he is rude to you."
The prickly aunt was tender enough, and Evie knew it.
"Oh, my dear!" she said. "It makes my old blood skip and sing to see you so happy. And Harry—my goodness, what a happy person Harry is!"
"I trust and believe he is," Evie said, "and my hope and exceeding reward are that he may always be. But to-day—to-day——" she said.
Lady Oxted was silent.
"Just think," said Evie, "what was happening a year ago. At this hour a year ago Harry was here with the doctor and his uncle and his uncle's servant. And then evening fell, as it is falling now. Later came Geoffrey and Jim. Oh, I can't yet bear to think of it!"
"I think if I were Harry I should be rather fond of those three," said Lady Oxted. "Being a woman, I am in love with them all, like you."
"Of course you are," said Evie. "Oh, yes, Jim was just going out when I was with his wife, to meet the others."