He afterwards remarked in a detached way to Lily that, after all, what he did at school was his own business, more or less.
"Father pays for you to go there," said Lily, instinctively aware that only such practical considerations would carry any weight to her youthful hearer.
"Yes, of course. But he needn't want to know whether I've made any nice friends, and rot of that sort."
"I know it's rather aggravating to be asked about that sort of thing," half whispered Lily, feeling herself to be guilty of treason. "But after all, it's because he's fond of us, that he wants to know everything about us."
"Being fond is such rot," said Kenneth, in his graceless and limited vocabulary.
Lily was quite glad to see him return to school before her own departure for Italy.
"I'm afraid you won't see your sister at home next holidays, my boy, so you and I will have to cheer one another up," said Philip nervously. "But it'll be a great treat for Lily to go abroad."
"Mind you send me some stamps for my collection, Lily," Kenneth said earnestly.
"Come, come, Kenneth. Try and not think quite so much about your own little concerns. Now say good-bye, my boy."
But the most determined sentimentalist upon earth could extract no conventional emotion out of Kenneth.