“Then I am happier than you, for I saw her three weeks since. I thought her looking somewhat frail and feeble, even more so than her wont; yet very ripe for Heaven, when as it shall please God to take her.”
There was no answer again. Aubrey’s cane applied itself diligently to making a plantain leaf lie to the right of its neighbour instead of the left.
“Mr Louvaine, did you ever hear that my mother and your grandfather were friends of old time?”
For the first time Aubrey turned his head fully, and looked at his companion. The face which Mr Marshall saw was not, as he had imagined it might be, sullen and reluctant to converse. It was only very, very weary and sad, with heavy eyes as though they had slept little, or were holding back unshed tears.
“No, never,” was all he said.
“My mother,” said Mr Marshall, “was an Oxfordshire woman, of Minster Lovel by her birth, but she wedded a bookseller in Oxford town, where she was in service to a lady. I think you were not present when I told this to my Lady Lettice. But do you remember your old friend Mrs Elizabeth Wolvercot, that she told me you were wont to call Cousin Bess?”
“Remember Cousin Bess! Of course I do,” said Aubrey, a tone of interest coming into his voice. “What of her?”
“My mother was her sister Ellen.”
“Why, Mr Marshall! are you my cousin?”
“If it please you to acknowledge me, Cousin Aubrey.”