“She is, after all—” She was going to say “your father’s sister,” but the expression was scarcely a happy one, and she turned it into, “She is, after all, growing old and lonely.”
“So are we all!” he cried, with a lapse of tone that was now characteristic in him.
“She oughtn’t to be so isolated from her proper relatives.”
There was a moment’s silence. Still playing with the book, he remarked, “You forget, she’s got her favourite nephew.”
A bright red flush spread over her cheeks. “What is the matter with you this afternoon?” she asked. “I should think you’d better go for a walk.”
“Before I go, tell me what is the matter with you.” He also flushed. “Why do you want me to make it up with my aunt?”
“Because it’s right and proper.”
“So? Or because she is old?”
“I don’t understand,” she retorted. But her eyes dropped. His sudden suspicion was true: she was legacy hunting.
“Agnes, dear Agnes,” he began with passing tenderness, “how can you think of such things? You behave like a poor person. We don’t want any money from Aunt Emily, or from any one else. It isn’t virtue that makes me say it: we are not tempted in that way: we have as much as we want already.”