"I rather like drinking tea in a cow shed," she remarked.
In a few moments Mr. Francis entered with his usual gay step, and in his hand he carried his large hat.
"How long since we met last, Lady Oxted!" he said. "And what a delight to see you here!"
"Miss Aylwin, Uncle Francis," said Harry, unceremoniously.
The old man turned quickly.
"Ah! my dear Miss Aylwin," he said—"my dear Miss Aylwin," and they shook hands.
Harry gave a little sigh of relief. Ever since his uncle's attack, a fortnight ago, he had felt in the back of his mind a little uneasiness about this meeting. It seemed he might have spared himself the pains. Nothing could have been simpler or more natural than Mr. Francis's manner; yet the warmth of his hand-shake, the form of words, more intimate than a man would use to a stranger, were admirably chosen—if choice were not a word too full of purpose for so spontaneous a greeting—to at once recognise and obliterate the past. The meeting was, as it were, a scene of reconciliation between two who had never set eyes on each other before, and between whom the horror of their vicarious estrangement would never be mentioned or even be allowed to be present in the mind. And Mr. Francis's words seemed to Harry to meet the situation with peculiar felicity.
The old man seated himself near Lady Oxted.
"This is an occasion," he said, "and both Harry and I have been greatly occupied with his house-warming. But the weather—there was little warming there to be done; surely we have ordered delightful weather for you. Harry told me that Miss Aylwin wished for a warm day. Indeed, his choice does not seem to me, a poor northerner, a bad one; but Miss Aylwin has perhaps had too much Italian weather to care for our poor imitation."
"Lord Vail refused to promise," said Evie; "at least he did not promise anything about the weather. I was afraid he would forget."