"No! too pale--far too pale. Have you got any blood, child? Oh, of course, you say you have. Sick people always do. You must eat more and take port wine. Guy, pour your wife out a glass of port."
Guy obediently did as he was told, but Alizon protested against being made to drink it.
"I'm really very strong, Miss Corbin----"
"Aunt Jelly," interrupted the old lady.
"Well, Aunt Jelly, I look delicate, but I'm not--I am----"
"Never mind what you are. Drink up the port. You're as bad as Minnie. Bless the child, do you think I don't know what's good for people? Teetotalism fudge? It all comes of adulterated drinks, though I daresay there's a good deal of truth in it. But a glass of good port is what you want and what you've got to take."
Alizon, anxious to please the old lady on her first visit, did as she was told, and then, after making Guy drink some sherry, Aunt Jelly proceeded to talk about Victoria.
"Yes, we met her abroad," said Lady Errington, sipping her wine, "a very charming girl."
"Ah, her father was such a handsome man," answered Aunt Jelly, with a secret thought of her dead and done with romance. "I never saw her mother."
"She was a Macjean, I believe," said Guy indolently, "at least Otterburn said something about his family being mixed up with hers."