“Never mind the beard, tell me about the money matters that your father and Mr. Berkins can't agree upon.”
“Mr. Berkins has offered to settle twelve thousand pounds upon me if father will settle the same amount. But father won't agree to this; he wants Mr. Berkins to settle twelve, but does not want to settle more than seven himself upon me.”
“Is this so, James?” asked Aunt Mary.
Mr. Brookes avoided answering the question, and entered into a long and garrulous statement concerning himself and his money: he had made it all himself! he spoke of his investments with pride, and pathetically declared that he would not marry again because he would not deprive his dear children of anything. Aunt Mary crossed her hands over her shawl, and set herself to listen to the old gentleman's rigmarole. Aunt Hester tried several times to cut him short, but this time he would not be silenced.
Then Aunt Mary started the story of a girl whom she had known intimately in early life, which she no doubt thought would help Grace to a better comprehension of her difficulties; but the dear lady lost herself in the domestic entanglement of many families, on the subject of which she contributed much curious information, without, however, elucidating the matter in hand. She wandered so far that at length all hope of return became impossible, and she was obliged to pull up suddenly and ask what she had been talking about.
“What was I talking about, James; you have been listening to me—what was I talking about?”
Mr. Brookes made no attempt to give the information necessary for the blending of her many narratives, and she was forced to seek unaided for the lost thread. Soon after the girls came in with their gin and water. They drank their grog, kissed their relations, and retired to bed.
And the next evening, and the next, and the next, so long as Aunt Mary and Aunt Hester remained at the Manor House, the evenings passed in a similar fashion; and, notwithstanding the doleful faces they occasionally assumed, they found pleasure in lamenting the follies of the young people. The same stories were told, almost the same words were uttered. The only malcontent was Willy. He had no interest in his sisters, and the hours after dinner in the billiard-room when his sisters were in the drawing-room were those he devoted to looking through his letters and filling up his diary; so when Sally's name was mentioned he caught at his short crisp hair and gnashed his teeth.