“I’m going to let them have their own way about all the things that don’t matter much. When it comes to something that does, it’ll be time enough to make a fuss. I think it’s rather good of them, really, to put up with me, considering they think Jim was a fool to marry me, and they don’t like me much, either. But they want Cecil to be brought up just like all the Aviolets.”
“That’s natural.”
“I daresay it is. They seem very stupid people, though,” said Rose reflectively. “I say, will you tell me something?”
“Certainly, if I can.”
“Is living in the country, in England, always like this? I mean, do you always potter about all day without doing anything, and look at the papers while you’re waiting for the next meal, and take the dogs for exercise, and never—never—never talk about anything but the rotten old garden, and whether it rained in the night and if the carriage can go to meet the four-thirty train? Don’t you ever, any of you, do anything?”
“You mustn’t ask me, you know. My brother and I are not like the Aviolets—not like county people. He’s a doctor, and works harder than most people, and I run his house, and we’ve only one servant, so that I’m busy, too.”
“Oh——” said Rose Aviolet.
Relief was detectable in her voice.
“Oh, I didn’t know that. I thought you were just like them,” she said naïvely.
“But don’t you like it at all, being at that big house, and never having to think about expenses or anything of that sort?” asked the doctor’s sister.